intimately

[ in-tuh-mit-lee ]

adverb

1. in a way that entails, assumes, or suggests a close, warm, trusting personal relationship:

   He was quick to rebuke others, but only those he knew intimately and loved dearly.

   Churchill spoke intimately and easily over the wireless to his own people during the war.

2. in a way that arises from long or frequent direct personal experience:

   Cycling acquaints you intimately with every bump, slice, crease, divot, ledge, ripple, and pothole in a street.

3. in a way that affords or encourages privacy, coziness, closeness of interaction, etc.:

   The small tables are so that people can converse more intimately, even among a larger group.

   The beautifully renovated 150-seat theater offers an intimately scaled setting with state-of-the-art acoustics.

4. in a way that involves a close union or connection:

   Many of the ailments seen in the inpatient service are intimately linked to the malnutrition plaguing the region.

5. in a way that involves or suggests sex:

   Posts must not contain name-calling, profanity, or intimately explicit material.

   Chlamydia is an intimately transmitted infection.

6. in a deep and detailed way:

   Her letters and journals reveal a woman intimately involved in the day-to-day happenings of the school.

7. in the innermost depths of one’s mind or heart:

   It has given me an opportunity to share ideas, thoughts, and intimately held beliefs with others equally interested in deeper questions.

8. next to the skin, as underclothing, wigs, etc.:

   Please read our exchange policy carefully; these are quality garments that are worn intimately and hence cannot be exchanged or returned.

Word History and Origins

Origin of intimately¹

intimate ¹( def ) + -ly

Example Sentences

It was an intimate class and I could speak in my normal voice, which I liked, but that also meant the phone was too loud for the room.

From MIT Technology Review

However, these superspreader events are intimate affairs associated with close contact and a lack of precautions.

From FiveThirtyEight

Well, we’re already letting machines do this in our most intimate spaces…inside our home.

From MIT Technology Review

Now, both men are in their homes, one self-isolating and the other dodging reporters asking about those texts, including messages that emerged late Tuesday suggesting an intimate encounter.

From Washington Post

It’s tough to predict what political impact the news that North Carolina Democratic Senate candidate Cal Cunningham had been sending intimate texts to a woman who isn’t his wife will have on the competitive Senate race there.

From Washington Post

They wrote about subjects that they knew intimately, or that troubled or fascinated them, which is what all novelists do.

From The Daily Beast

Now Kendall Jenner is intimately interlocked with Cara Delevingne.

From The Daily Beast

However the American sexual ideal is intimately related to a certain idea of masculinity.

From The Daily Beast

Other Nazi leaders would get intimately involved in the lives of the artists as well.

From The Daily Beast

When this happened I told Michael first, very intimately and in much more detail, what was going on.

From The Daily Beast

Indeed, his success was widely known, and Jean Baptiste had been rather curious to know the family intimately.

From Project Gutenberg

His namdee was intimately associated with French politics, from the commencement of the revolution in 1789.

From Project Gutenberg

When the mucus is small in amount and intimately mixed with the stool, the trouble is probably in the small intestine.

From Project Gutenberg

From these instruments have come all those precise examinations on which the accuracy of modern science intimately depends.

From Project Gutenberg

Nicholas Rubinstein is intimately associated with every event in Tchaikovskys private and public life.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• informally
• personally