mainly

Etymology

From main +‎ -ly.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈmeɪnli/

Adverb

mainly (not comparable)

1. (obsolete) Forcefully, vigorously. [14th-17th c.]
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Qveene. […], London: […] William Ponsonbie, OCLC 960102938, book III, canto I:

     Mainly they all attonce vpon him laid, / And sore beset on euery side around […]

2. (obsolete) Of the production of a sound: loudly, powerfully. [14th-19th c.]
   • 1603, John Florio, transl.; Michel de Montaigne, The Essayes, […], printed at London: […] Edward Blount […], OCLC 946730821:
     , II.31:

     But in the end, mainly crying out, he fell to raling and wringing his master, upbraiding him that he was not a true Philosopher […].

3. (obsolete) To a great degree; very much. [15th-19th c.]
4. Chiefly; for the most part. [from 17th c.]
   • 1913, Joseph C. Lincoln, chapter 12, in Mr. Pratt's Patients:

     She had Lord James' collar in one big fist and she pounded the table with the other and talked a blue streak. Nobody could make out plain what she said, for she was mainly jabbering Swede lingo, but there was English enough, of a kind, to give us some idee.

Anagrams

• Milyan, aminyl, amylin