Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of, relating to, or characteristic of women, often in showing qualities traditionally attributed to women.
  • adjective Fully developed as a woman, as in having a curvaceous figure.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Characteristic of, like, or befitting a woman; suiting a woman; feminine; not masculine; not girlish: as, womanly behavior.
  • Synonyms Womanish, Ladylike, etc. See feminine.
  • In the manner of a woman.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Becoming a woman; feminine.
  • adverb In the manner of a woman; with the grace, tenderness, or affection of a woman.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Having the characteristics of a woman; feminine, female.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective befitting or characteristic of a woman especially a mature woman

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

woman +‎ -ly

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Examples

  • It could be part culture that being womanly is being pleasant and agreeable.

    A Kuranian Take on the Religious Gender Gap, Bryan Caplan | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty 2009

  • I call womanly; it was not like Ethelbertha at all.

    Three Men on the Bummel 1893

  • Study, exercise, housework, and many wholesome pleasures kept her a happy, hearty creature, yearly growing in womanly graces, yet always preserving the innocent freshness girls lose so soon when too early set upon the world's stage and given a part to play.

    Rose in Bloom 1876

  • What you call womanly honor I have been taught to hold as sacred as you yourself, and

    Serapis — Volume 06 Georg Ebers 1867

  • What you call womanly honor I have been taught to hold as sacred as you yourself, and

    Serapis — Volume 06 Georg Ebers 1867

  • What you call womanly honor I have been taught to hold as sacred as you yourself, and I have kept it as untainted as any girl living.

    Complete Project Gutenberg Georg Ebers Works Georg Ebers 1867

  • What you call womanly honor I have been taught to hold as sacred as you yourself, and

    Serapis — Volume 06 Georg Ebers 1867

  • What you call womanly honor I have been taught to hold as sacred as you yourself, and I have kept it as untainted as any girl living.

    Serapis — Complete Georg Ebers 1867

  • She's not what I call womanly, and I hate these unsexed females. "

    The Simpkins Plot George A. Birmingham 1907

  • "That girl, whom I so loved, whom I treated as my child, who was to me an image of what they call womanly purity, throws herself away upon my most detested enemy, a loathsome corpse, whose body, soul, and spirit had already decayed.

    Debts of Honor M��r J��kai 1864

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