# sprightly

> English word · Adjective · IPA /ˈspɹaɪtli/ · frequency rank #53,868

## Definitions
1. Animated, gay, or vivacious; lively, spirited.
2. Of a person: full of life and vigour, especially with a light and springy step.
3. Of a person: full of life and vigour, especially with a light and springy step.
4. Of or relating to a sprite; ghostly, spectral.

## Etymology
From spright + -ly (suffix forming adjectives with the sense ‘behaving like, having the nature of’). Spright is an obsolete variant of sprite (“a shade, spirit; elf, fairy, goblin; apparition, ghost”), from Middle English sprit (“principle of life; soul, especially at the point of death; immaterial being (angel, demon, apparition, ghost, etc.); divine inspiration; Holy Spirit; the mind, intellect, reason; mental faculties, senses; power of prophecy; character, disposition; courage, resolution; mood, state of mind; human will; breath; (alchemy) volatile substance”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman esprite, esprit and Middle French esprit, variants of Anglo-Norman, Middle French, Old French espirit, esperit (“spirit”), from Latin spīritus (“air; breath; breathing; ghost, spirit”), from spīrō (“to breathe; to breathe out, exhale”) (from Proto-Indo-European *(s)peys- (“to blow; to breathe”)) + -tus (“suffix forming verbal nouns from verbs”).

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/word/sprightly