mainly

From Middle English maynly; equivalent to main +‎ -ly.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈmeɪnli/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -eɪnli

mainly (not comparable)

1. Chiefly; for the most part. [from 17th c.]
   • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter XII, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y., London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:

     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.

2. (obsolete) Forcefully, vigorously. [13th–17th c.]
   • c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, →ISBN, Act (please specify |act=I or II), scene i:

     Such breadth of ſhoulders as might mainely beare
     Olde Atlas burthen, […]

   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book III, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC:

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

3. (obsolete) Of the production of a sound: loudly, powerfully. [14th–19th c.]
   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 31, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:

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

4. (obsolete) To a great degree; very much. [15th–19th c.]

• (for the most part): in the main, principally; see also Thesaurus:mostly
• (forcefully): energetically, powerfully, strongly
• (loudly): earsplittingly, lustily, raucously, thunderously
• (to a great degree): a lot, extremely

• amain

• Milyan, aminyl, amylin

mainly

1. Alternative form of maynly