Anyhow

Part of speech: adverb

Pronunciation: /ˈɛn.i.haʊ/

Definitions

1. In spite of that or in any case; used to resume a topic or indicate something will happen regardless of circumstances
2. In any event or regardless of the situation, this term conveys a sense of moving forward or returning to a topic at hand
3. This word suggests proceeding with a matter despite previous obstacles or summarizing a discussion regardless of what precedes it

Etymology: Anyhow is a compound of "any" and "how," and the "any" half is itself a fossil of a much longer word. Old English "ǣniġ" was built from "ān," meaning "one," plus the adjective-forming suffix "-ig," so "any" originally meant something like "one-ish" or "one of some number." Its ancestor in Proto-Germanic was "ainagaz," a word that descends from the same Indo-European root that gave Latin "unus," so "any" and "one" are distant cousins, with "any" carrying the older sense of picking out a single member from a group. The "how" half is much simpler. It comes from Old English "hū," an interrogative and adverb meaning "in what way," and the compound was formed in English from these two elements. Combined, "any how" meant "in any manner whatever," and the sense of "regardless" or "in any case" developed from that idea of a manner that does not matter. The spelling as one word came later.

Synonyms: anyway, regardless

Antonyms: specifically