Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
Definition: Ghostly |
GhostlyAdjective1. Like or being a phantom; "a ghostly face at the window"; "a phantasmal presence in the room"; "spectral emanations"; "spiritual tappings at a seance". Source: WordNet 1.7.1 Copyright © 2001 by Princeton University. All rights reserved. |
Date "ghostly" was first used in popular English literature: sometime before 1350. (references) |
Synonyms: GhostlySynonyms: apparitional (adj), ghostlike (adj), phantasmal (adj), spectral (adj), spiritual (adj). (additional references) |
| Context | Synonyms within Context (source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus). |
Deity | Superhuman, supernatural; ghostly, spiritual, hyperphysical, unearthly; theistic, theocratic; anointed; soterial. |
Demon | Adjective: demonic, demonical, impish, demoniacal; fiendish, fiend-like; supernatural, weird, uncanny, unearthly, spectral; ghostly, ghost-like; elfin, elvin, elfish, elflike; haunted; pokerish. |
Intellect | Adjective: intellectual, mental, rational, subjective, metaphysical, nooscopic, spiritual; ghostly; psychical, psychological; cerebral; animastic; brainy; hyperphysical, superphysical; subconscious, subliminal. |
| Source: adapted from Roget's Thesaurus. | |
Crosswords: Ghostly |
| English words defined with "ghostly": apparition, apparitional ♦ doppelganger ♦ ghostlike ♦ Peziza domicilina, phantasmal, phantom ♦ shadow, specter, spectral, spectre, spiritual. (references) |
| Etymologies containing "ghostly": larval. (references) |
| Domain | Usage | |
Screenplays | It's ghostly quiet, like it's the last place on earth (The Last Place On Earth; writing credit: James Slocum) Ghostly hauntings I turn loose Beetlejuice (Beetlejuice; writing credit: Manfred Purzer) | |
Movie/TV Titles | A Ghostly Wallop (1922) Ghostly Estate (1989) | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | ||
| Domain | Title |
Books | |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Thumbnail | Description & Credit | Thumbnail | Description & Credit |
 | This ghostly apparition is actually an interstellar cloud caught in the process of ... Credit: NASA. |  | A strange company, wizard, and ghostly, wandering over the snow. Credit: Library of Congress. |
 | Woman embracing ghostly man to the surprise of onlookers. Credit: Library of Congress. |  | So haunted at moonlight with bat and owl and ghostly moth --. Credit: Library of Congress. |
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits. | |||
 |
| "Ghostly trees" by Helen Mc Commentary: "Thought these trees looked a bit ghostly...taken in a park in Brisbane, Australia." |
Source: photographs selected by the editor, with permission from the photographers. |
| Play | Caption |
 | Spooky; chilling, creepy, eerie, ghostly, mysterious, ominous, scary, spine-chilling, supernatural, uncanny, unearthly, weird; fright. |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Title | Author | Quote |
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy | Douglas Adams | The suns blazed into the pitch of space and a low ghostly music floated through the bridge: Marvin was humming ironically because he hated humans so much |
Les Miserables | Hugo, Victor | It seemed as if it were a ghostly voice speaking to you across the portal of the tomb |
Source: compiled by the editor from various references. | ||
| "Ghostly" is generally used as an adjective (general or positive) -- approximately 100.00% of the time. "Ghostly" is used about 260 times out of a sample of 100 million words spoken or written in English. Its rank is based on over 700,000 words used in the English language. Some parts-of-speech are not covered due to the samples used by the British National Corpus. (note: percents less than one-hundredth of one percent have been omitted) |
| Parts of Speech | Percent | Usage per 100 Million Words | Rank in English |
| Adjective (general or positive) | 100% | 260 | 18,316 |
Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.
Expression using "ghostly": ghostly enemy. Additional references. | |
| Hyphenated Usage | |
Beginning with "ghostly": ghostly-like, ghostly-white. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| The following statistics estimate the number of searches per day across the major English-language search engines as identified by various trade publications. Hyperlinks lead to commercial use of the expression at Amazon.com. |
| Expression | Frequency per Day |
ghostly picture | 38 |
ghostly | 15 |
ghostly image | 13 |
ghostly photo | 11 |
encounter ghostly | 8 |
ghostly international | 5 |
ghostly orbs | 5 |
apparition ghostly | 5 |
ghostly pic | 5 |
ghostly happening | 5 |
ghostly sound | 4 |
california ghostly guide haunted house | 3 |
ghostly manor | 3 |
alice ghostly | 3 |
ghostly story | 3 |
ghostly sighting | 2 |
creation ghostly | 2 |
ghostly grave | 2 |
ghostly photograph | 2 |
experience ghostly | 2 |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. | |
| Language | Translations for "ghostly"; alternative meanings/domain in parentheses. | |
Albanian | shpirtëror (incorporeal, inward, noetic, otherworldly, soulful, spiritual). (various references) | |
Arabic | طيفي (spectral), روحي (immaterial, incorporeal, inner, inward, mental, pneumatic, spiritual, unearthly, unworldly), شبحي (ghastly, spectral, spiritual, spooky). (various references) | |
Bulgarian | призрачен (dreamy, phantasmal, shadowy, spectral, spooky, unearthly, unsubstantial, visionary), духовен (clerical, clerkly, immaterial, inner, moral, noetic, otherworldly, platonic, spiritual, unfleshly, unworldly). (various references) | |
Chinese | 鬼 (spectral). (various references) | |
Czech | strašidelný (creepy, frightening, haunted, haunting, macabre, scary, spectral, spooky, unearthly). (various references) | |
Finnish | aavemainen (eerie, ghostlike). (various references) | |
French | spirituel, spectral (ghostlike), fantomatique. (various references) | |
German | geisterhaft (disembodied, phantasmal, spectral, spookily, spooky, supernatural, unearthly). (various references) | |
Greek | σαν στοιχείο, σαν φάντασμα (ghostlike), πνευματικόσ (confessor, pneumatic, spiritual), ωσ φάντασμα, άυλοσ. (various references) | |
Hebrew | כמו רוח רפאים. (various references) | |
Hungarian | kísérteties (eerie, gaunt, ghastly, ghoulish, lurid, macabre, spectral, spookish, spooky, withered). (various references) | |
Italian | spirituale (mental, spiritual, unworldly), spettrale (ghostlike, phantom, spectral, unearthly, unreal). (various references) | |
Japanese Kanji | 妖気 (unearthly, weird). (various references) | |
Japanese Katakana | ようき (cheerfulness, container, instrument, season, tool, unearthly, vessel, weather, weird). (various references) | |
Manx | scaanjoonagh (ghostlike, phantom), scaanagh (crannied, ghastly, ghostlike, mirrorlike, representative, spectral, specular, spooky), quaagh (alien, aloof, foreign, odd, peculiar, psychic, psychical, quaint, strange, supernatural, uncanny, weird). (various references) | |
Pig Latin | ostlyghay.(various references) | |
Portuguese | fantasmal (phantasmal, spectral), fantasmagórico (dreamlike, phantasmagoric), espiritual (immaterial, mental, spiritual, unworldly), espectral (dreamlike, phantasmal, spectral). (various references) | |
Romanian | spiritual (bright, clever, ecclesiastic, ecclesiastical, humorous, humoursome, immaterial, ingeniously, mental, moral, neat, sacerdotal, sacred, smart, spirited, spiritual, witty), spectral (spectral, spookish), imaterial (aeriform, aery, immaterial, incorporeal, insubstantial, spiritual, unsubstantial), fantomatic (dreamlike, ghostlike, phantom-like, spectral, spookish, vague). (various references) | |
Russian | призрачный (illusive, phantasmal, phantom, shadowy, spectral, spooky, visionary). (various references) | |
Scottish | stìc (ghostly person). (various references) | |
Serbo-Croatian | sablastan (eery, phantasmal, spooky). (various references) | |
Spanish | fantasmal (phantasmal, spooky). (various references) | |
Swedish | spöklik (eerie, eery, gaunt, ghastly, ghostlike, lurid, spectral, spooky, uncanny). (various references) | |
Thai | เหมือนผี. (various references) | |
Turkish | ruhani (disembodied, ethereal, ghostlike, hiero-, immaterial, psychic, spiritual, unworldly), manevi (bodiless, ghostlike, incorporeal, inner, intangible, moral, spiritual, unearthly, unworldly), hayalet gibi (ghostlike, spectral, spookish, spooky). (various references) | |
Ukrainian | примарний (apparitional, dreamlike, dreamy, elfish, elvish, ghastly, illusive, illusory, phantasmal, spectral, spooky, visional), духовний (clerical, ecclesiastic, ecclesiastical, inward, psychic, sacred, spiritual, unworldly). (various references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various translation references. | ||
Misspellings | |
"Ghostly" is suggested in spellcheckers for the following: Ghosal, Ghostley, ghosty, ghotly, Goatly, goosteli, goostli, Goostly, gostely. (additional references) | |
| Source: compiled by the editor, based on several corpora (additional references). | |
| # of Phoneme Matches | Pronunciation | Word(s) rhyming with "ghostly" (pronounced gō"stlē) |
| 5 | -ō" s t l ē | mostly. |
| 4 | -s t l ē | costly, dishonestly, justly, lastly, earnestly, firstly, ghastly, honestly, manifestly, modestly, priestly, robustly, steadfastly, unjustly, vastly. |
| 3 | -t l ē | abruptly, absolutely, abundantly, accidently, accurately, acutely, adamantly, adequately, adroitly, affectionately, alternately, apparently, appropriately, approximately, aptly, ardently, arrogantly, astutely, blatantly, bluntly, brightly, brilliantly, coherently, commensurately, compassionately, competently, complacently, completely, concomitantly, concretely, concurrently, confidently, consequently, consistently, constantly, conveniently, correctly, courtly, covertly, currently, curtly, decently, defiantly, definitely, deftly, deliberately, delicately, desperately, devoutly, differently, difficultly, diligently, directly, discreetly, jointly, knightly, lately, dispassionately, disproportionately, distinctly, efficiently, elaborately, elegantly, eloquently, eminently, evidently, exactly, excellently, expertly, explicitly, exquisitely, extravagantly, exultantly, faintly, fervently, flagrantly, flamboyantly, flatly, fluently, forthrightly, fortnightly, fortunately, fraudulently, frequently, gently, greatly, hesitantly, hotly, illicitly, immaculately, immediately, imminently, impatiently, imperfectly, implicitly, importantly, imprudently, inaccurately, inadequately, inadvertently, inappropriately, incessantly, incoherently, incompetently, incorrectly, indefinitely, independently, indignantly, indirectly, indiscriminately, inefficiently, ineptly, infinitely, infrequently, inherently, innately, innocently, inordinately, insistently, instantly, insufficiently, intelligently, intently, intermittently, intimately, intricately, legitimately, leniently, lightly, magnificently, militantly, minutely, moderately, motley, neatly, negligently, nightly, nonchalantly, obediently, overtly, partly, passionately, patently, patiently, perfectly, permanently, persistently, pleasantly, poignantly, politely, portly, predominantly, presently, privately, prominently, promptly, proportionately, prudently, pungently, quaintly, quietly, raptly, recently, reluctantly, remotely, resolutely, reverently, rightly, saintly, secretly, separately, shortly, significantly, silently, slightly, smartly, softly, sprightly, stately, stoutly, strictly, stridently, stringently, subsequently, succinctly, sufficiently, sweetly, swiftly, tacitly, tightly, transparently, triumphantly, ultimately, unfortunately, unpleasantly, unsightly, urgently, valiantly, vehemently, violently, virulently, Whitely. |
Source: compiled by the editor (additional references); see credits. | ||
Scrabble® Enable2K-Verified Anagrams | |
| Words within the letters "g-h-l-o-s-t-y" | |
-1 letter: ghosty, hostly. | |
-2 letters: ghost, glost, holts, hotly, sloth, stogy, yoghs. | |
-3 letters: gosh, goys, hogs, hols, holt, holy, host, hots, hoys, logs, logy, lost, loth, lots, shog, shot, slog, slot, soth, togs, tosh, toys, yogh. | |
-4 letters: gos, got, goy, hog, hot, hoy, log, lot, ohs, shy, sly, sol, sot, soy, sty, tho, thy, tog, toy. | |
| Words containing the letters "g-h-l-o-s-t-y" | |
+2 letters: histology. | |
+3 letters: soothingly. | |
+4 letters: eschatology, holystoning, hydrologist, lightsomely, mythologers, mythologies, mythologist, petroglyphs, phycologist, righteously, stylography. | |
+5 letters: hydrologists, mythologists, mythologizes, phycologists, physiologist, polygraphist, psychologist. | |
| Source: compiled by the editor from various references; see credits. SCRABBLE® is a registered trademark. All intellectual property rights in and to the game are owned in the U.S.A and Canada by Hasbro Inc., and throughout the rest of the world by J.W. Spear & Sons Limited of Maidenhead, Berkshire, England, a subsidiary of Mattel Inc. Mattel and Spear are not affiliated with Hasbro. | |
| 1. Definition 2. Synonyms 3. Crosswords 4. Usage: Modern | 5. Usage: Commercial 6. Images: Slideshow 7. Images: Photo Album 8. Images: Digital Art | 9. Sounds 10. Quotations: Fiction 11. Usage Frequency 12. Expressions | 13. Expressions: Internet 14. Translations: Modern 15. Derivations 16. Rhymes | 17. Anagrams 18. Bibliography |
Copyright © Philip M. Parker, INSEAD. Terms of Use.
