adv. [f. SUPERIOR a. + -LY2.] In a superior place, degree or manner.
1. In a higher position or place; in the upper part, above; to a higher position, upwards.
1556. J. Heywood, Spider & F., lxxxviii. 109. Spiders are plaste a boue superiorlie, And flies beneth them plaste inferiorlie.
1597. A. M., trans. Guillemeau’s Fr. Chirurg., 46/2. The third ascendeth superiorlye, from the soule of the foote towardes the knees. Ibid. (1599), trans. Gabelhouer’s Bk. Physicke, 144/2. An externall meanes to provoack stooles for those which nether superiourlye, nor inferiourlye can vse anye Physick.
1836. Penny Cycl., V. 260/1. Its belly of a reddish brown superiorly and a dirty grey beneath.
1870. Rolleston, Anim. Life, 141. In this central furrow [was] lodged … most superiorly the water-vascular canal.
2. In a higher degree, more highly, better.
1643. Sir J. Spelman, Case of Affairs, 15. The superioritie … that is subordinately in the inferiour Courts, is but more superiourly in the House of Lords than them.
1779. W. Alexander, Hist. Women (1782), I. viii. 280. Where the love of the men is directed more to the sex than the individual, a woman has no motive to excite even a wish of being superiorly beautiful.
1816. Bentham, Chrestom., i. Wks. 1843, VIII. 16/1. The superiorly instructed boy.
1828. P. Cunningham, N. S. Wales (ed. 3), II. 327. Superiorly watered to almost any other district in the colony.
1830. Marryat, King’s Own, xxxi. The launch … firing round and grape … with a rapidity that almost enabled her to return gun for gun to her superiorly-armed antagonist.
3. In positive or absolute sense: In a high degree, highly; more or better than the generality; beyond the average; supereminently.
1728. Morgan, Algiers, I. Pref. p. xiv. A Person so superiorly capable of giving it.
1755. Shebbeare, Lydia (1769), I. 314. The … dejection … that attends those who chuse mourning for the death of those whom they love superiorly.
1783. H. Walpole, Lett. to Earl of Strafford, 11 Dec. With regard to letter-writing, I am firmly persuaded that it is a province in which women will always shine superiorly.
1802. Mrs. E. Parsons, Myst. Visit, I. 98. To conceive their woes superiorly great.
1802–12. Bentham, Ration. Judic. Evid. (1827), V. 474. Evidence … of a nature so superiorly trustworthy.
1835. Beckford, Recoll., etc., 18. This superiorly fine and glowing morning.
1882. Stevenson, New Arab. Nts., II. xii. 220. Even my knowledge of life is a work of art superiorly composed.
4. With an air or attitude of superiority.
1844. Emerson, Ess., Nominalist & Realist. The audience … judge very wisely and superiorly how wrongheaded and unskilful is each of the debaters to his own affair.
So Superiorness, superiority.
1796. Mme. D’Arblay, Camilla, III. vi. I don’t see the great superiorness of learning, if it can’t keep a man’s temper out of a passion.
