Every

Pronunciation

• UK IPA: /ˈɛv.ɹi/, /ˈɛv.É™.ɹi/
• Hyphenation: eve + ry or ev + e + ry

Alternative forms

• ev’ry (poetic)
• euery (obsolete)

Origin

From Middle English every, everich, which is made up of Old English ǣfre ("ever") + ǣlċ ("each"). Furthermore, ǣfre itself comes from ā in fēore ("ever in life"), and ǣlċ from ā ġelīċ ("ever alike"). Thus equivalent to ever + each.

Full definition of every

Determiner

1. All of a countable group, without exception.
• 1918, W. B. Maxwell, The Mirror and the Lamp Chapter 5, Here, in the transept and choir, where the service was being held, one was conscious every moment of an increasing brightness; colours glowing vividly beneath the circular chandeliers, and the rows of small lights on the choristers' desks flashed and sparkled in front of the boys' faces, deep linen collars, and red neckbands.
• 2013-06-07, David Simpson, Fantasy of navigation, Like most human activities, ballooning has sponsored heroes and hucksters and a good deal in between. For every dedicated scientist patiently recording atmospheric pressure and wind speed while shivering at high altitudes, there is a carnival barker with a bevy of pretty girls willing to dangle from a basket or parachute down to earth.
2. Every person in the room stood and cheered.
3. Used with ordinal numbers to denote those items whose position is divisible by the corresponding cardinal number, or a portion of equal size to that set.
   Every third bead was red, and the rest were blue.  The sequence was thus red, blue, blue, red, blue, blue etc.
   Decimation originally meant the execution of every tenth soldier in a unit.

Synonyms

• each

Antonyms

• no

Derived terms

Anagrams

• veery
• verye