seldom - Wiktionary, the free dictionary (original) (raw)

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary

From late Middle English seldom, alteration of earlier selden by analogy with adverbial datives such as whilom, from Old English seldan (“seldom”), from Proto-West Germanic *seldanā, from Proto-Germanic *seldanē.

Cognate with Saterland Frisian säilden (“seldom”), West Frisian selden, komselden (“rare, seldom”), Dutch zelden, German selten, Danish sjælden, Norwegian Bokmål sjelden, Norwegian Nynorsk sjeldan, Swedish sällan, Faroese sjáldan, Icelandic sjaldan. More at seld and selly.

seldom (comparative more seldom or seldomer, superlative most seldom or seldomest)

  1. Infrequently, rarely.
    Synonyms: barely, hardly, rarely, scarcely, infrequently, seldomly; see also Thesaurus:rarely
    Antonyms: often, frequently; see also Thesaurus:often
    They seldom come here now.
    • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter VIII, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
      I corralled the judge, and we started off across the fields, in no very mild state of fear of that gentleman's wife, whose vigilance was seldom relaxed.
    • 1951, John Wyndham, The Day of the Triffids, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, published 1954, page 21:
      But one thing I was perfectly certain about. Reality or nightmare, I needed a drink as I had seldom needed one before.
    • 1974, Tom Brock, “There's Nothing In This World That Can Stop Me From Loving You”, in I Love You More And More:
      No well-meaning friends sayin' bad things / No friends' telephone that only seldom rings / No lingering doubts that try to bring me down / Can turn my love around or make me give up, darling
    • 1984, 20:05 from the start, in Dune‎[1] (Science Fiction), →OCLC:
      I'll miss the sea. But a person needs new experiences. They draw something deep inside, allowing him to grow. Without change, something sleeps inside us and seldom awakens. The sleeper must awaken.
    • 2013 April 9, Andrei Lankov, “Stay Cool. Call North Korea’s Bluff.”, in New York Times‎[2]:
      People who talk about an imminent possibility of war seldom pose this question: What would North Korea’s leadership get from unleashing a war that they are likely to lose in weeks, if not days?
    • 2013 June 1, “End of the peer show”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8838, page 71:
      Finance is seldom romantic. But the idea of peer-to-peer lending comes close. This is an industry that brings together individual savers and lenders on online platforms. Those that want to borrow are matched with those that want to lend.

seldom (comparative more seldom or seldomer, superlative most seldom or seldomest)

  1. (archaic) Rare; infrequent.
    Synonyms: geason, uncommon; see also Thesaurus:rare
    • 1651, Jer[emy] Taylor, The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living. […], 2nd edition, London: […] Francis Ashe […], →OCLC:
      a suppressed and seldom anger
    • 1850, Vignaud Pamphlets: Sir Isaac Newton, page 513:
      He was very curious in his garden, which was never out of order; in which he would at seldom times take a short walk or two, not enduring to see a weed in it.

infrequent

From Old English seldan.

seldom

  1. alternative form of selden (“seldom”)

From Old English selden.

seldom

  1. alternative form of selden (“uncommon”)