Always

Part of speech: adverb

Pronunciation: /ˈɔːl.weɪz/

Definitions

1. Constantly or on every occasion without exception throughout all time
2. At all times and without fail in every instance or circumstance
3. In every situation without exception or interruption, continuously over time

Etymology: The most surprising thing about "always" is that its ending is a fossil. Old English had "ealneġ" and "ealne weġ", meaning roughly "all the way" or "all the while", built from "eal" (all) and "weg" (way, road), in the accusative case, so the phrase literally described travelling the whole distance. Over time the "weg" part wore down into "alwey" and "alway", but the "-s" lingered on from the genitive-like endings that Middle English added to adverbs, giving "alweyes" and "alwayes". That extra "s" was eventually dropped, which is why we say "always" with no final "s" in its ending. The word's core sense, then, is spatial and temporal at once: to be "always" somewhere was to have been on the whole road. Scots kept a close cousin of the form, and a Low German relative, "allerwegens", meant "very often", which shows how the same image of unbroken movement could shade toward frequency rather than strict permanence.

Synonyms: forever, eternally, constantly, invariably, perpetually

Antonyms: never, occasionally, seldom, rarely, sometimes