seldom
/ˈsɛldəm/
Word Rarity
Rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 3.63 in modern English
9
Scrabble Score
6
Letters
2
Syllables
6
Unique Chars
Meaning
adv
Example Sentences
- "They seldom come here now."
- "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."
- "But one thing I was perfectly certain about. Reality or nightmare, I needed a drink as I had seldom needed one before."
- "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"
- "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."
- "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?"
Etymology
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.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: seldom, seldan, *seldanā, *seldanē
Usage
Inflected Forms
more seldom (comparative)
seldomer (comparative)
most seldom (superlative)
seldomest (superlative)
seldome (alternative, obsolete)