English

Adjective

very ‎(not generally comparable, comparative verier, superlative veriest)

1. True, real, actual.

   The fierce hatred of a very woman.  The very blood and bone of our grammar.  He tried his very best.‎

   • Bible, Genesis xxvii. 21

     whether thou be my very son Esau or not

   • John Milton (1608-1674)

     The very essence of truth is plainness and brightness.

   • Edmund Burke (1729-1797)

     I looked on the consideration of public service or public ornament to be real and very justice.

   • 1914, Louis Joseph Vance, Nobody, chapter III:

     Turning back, then, toward the basement staircase, she began to grope her way through blinding darkness, but had taken only a few uncertain steps when, of a sudden, she stopped short and for a little stood like a stricken thing, quite motionless save that she quaked to her very marrow in the grasp of a great and enervating fear.

   • 2012 November 7, Matt Bai, “Winning a Second Term, Obama Will Confront Familiar Headwinds”, in New York Times:

     The country’s first black president, and its first president to reach adulthood after the Vietnam War and Watergate, Mr. Obama seemed like a digital-age leader who could at last dislodge the stalemate between those who clung to the government of the Great Society, on the one hand, and those who disdained the very idea of government, on the other.

2. The same; identical.

   He proposed marriage in the same restaurant, at the very table where they first met.  That's the very tool that I need.‎

   • 1879, Richard Jefferies, The Amateur Poacher, chapter1:

     Molly the dairymaid came a little way from the rickyard, and said she would pluck the pigeon that very night after work. She was always ready to do anything for us boys; and we could never quite make out why they scolded her so for an idle hussy indoors. It seemed so unjust. Looking back, I recollect she had very beautiful brown eyes.

3. With limiting effect: mere.
   • 1603, John Florio, translating Michel de Montaigne, Essayes, London: Edward Blount, OCLC 946730821, I.40:

     We have many examples in our daies, yea in very children, of such as for feare of some slight incommoditie have yeelded unto death.

Synonyms

• ilk, selfsame

Translations

Adverb

very ‎(not comparable)

1. To a great extent or degree; extremely; exceedingly.

   You’re drinking very slowly.‎

   • 1915, Mrs. Belloc Lowndes, The Lodger, chapter II:

     Then his sallow face brightened, for the hall had been carefully furnished, and was very clean. ¶ There was a neat hat-and-umbrella stand, and the stranger's weary feet fell soft on a good, serviceable dark-red drugget, which matched in colour the flock-paper on the walls.

   • 1918, W. B. Maxwell, chapter 13, in The Mirror and the Lamp:

     “[…] They talk of you as if you were Croesus—and I expect the beggars sponge on you unconscionably.” And Vickers launched forth into a tirade very different from his platform utterances. He spoke with extreme contempt of the dense stupidity exhibited on all occasions by the working classes.

2. True, truly.

   He was the very best runner there.‎

Usage notes

• When used in their senses as degree adverbs, "very" and "too" never modify verbs.

Synonyms

• (to a great extent): ever so, main (dialectal), sore (archaic), swith (dialectal), way too

Translations

Statistics

Anagrams

• ev'ry

Middle English

Alternative forms

• verai, veray, verra, verray, verre, verrei, verrey, verri, verry
• werai, werrai, wery

Etymology

Old French verai

Adjective

very ‎(comparative verier)

1. true

Quotations

For usage examples of this term, see Citations:very.

Adverb

very

1. very