nebulously

Hello, you have come here looking for the meaning of the word nebulously. In DICTIOUS you will not only get to know all the dictionary meanings for the word nebulously, but we will also tell you about its etymology, its characteristics and you will know how to say nebulously in singular and plural. Everything you need to know about the word nebulously you have here. The definition of the word nebulously will help you to be more precise and correct when speaking or writing your texts. Knowing the definition ofnebulously, as well as those of other words, enriches your vocabulary and provides you with more and better linguistic resources.

English

WOTD – 19 December 2007

Etymology

From nebulous +‎ -ly.

Pronunciation

Adverb

nebulously (comparative more nebulously, superlative most nebulously)

  1. In a manner like that of a cloud or haze.
    The vapour drifted nebulously into the hall.
  2. As if viewed through a cloud or haze.
  3. Vaguely, without clear purpose or specific intention.
    He waved his hand nebulously in the direction he intended to go.
    • 1934, Agatha Christie, chapter 3, in Murder on the Orient Express, London: HarperCollins, published 2017, page 218:
      'I see, nebulously as yet, a certain explanation that would cover the facts as we know them.'

Quotations

  • 1866, Herman Melville, Battle-Pieces and Aspects of the War:
    The bladed guns are gleaming—
        Drift in lengthened trim,
    Files on files for hazy miles—
        Nebulously dim.
  • 1905, Jack London, chapter IV, in The Game:
    And there he stood, all but naked, godlike, in a white blaze of light. She had never conceived of the form of God except as nebulously naked, and the thought-association was startling.
  • 1920, Sinclair Lewis, chapter XVI, in Main Street: The Story of Carol Kennicott, New York, N.Y.: Harcourt, Brace and Howe, →OCLC:
    Mysteriously aching, nebulously sad, she slipped away, half-convinced but only half-convinced that it was horrible and unnatural, this postponement of release of mother-affection, this sacrifice to her opinionation and to his cautious desire for prosperity.
  • 1928 February, H P Lovecraft, “The Call of Cthulhu”, in Farnsworth Wright, editor, Weird Tales: A Magazine of the Bizarre and Unusual, volume 11, number 2, Indianapolis, Ind.: Popular Fiction Pub. Co., →OCLC, pages 159–178 and 287:
    For an instant the ship was befouled by an acrid and blinding green cloud, and then there was only a venomous seething astern; where - God in heaven! - the scattered plasticity of that nameless sky-spawn was nebulously recombining in its hateful original form, whilst its distance widened every second as the Alert gained impetus from its mounting steam.
  • 1931, H. P. Lovecraft, chapter 6, in The Whisperer in Darkness:
    Archaic covered bridges lingered fearsomely out of the past in pockets of the hills, and the half-abandoned railway track paralleling the river seemed to exhale a nebulously visible air of desolation.

Translations

Wikious
Boobota
Sagapedia