headlong

CEFRC1

/ˈhɛd.lɒŋ/

adverb · adjective

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

01
adverb
With the head first or with great speed and little control.
02
adverb
Extra detail
Rashly; precipitately; without deliberation; in haste, hastily.

Examples

He throws himself headlong into everything he undertakes.
Mugabe's regime did not so much slide as plunge headlong into kleptocracy.

At a glance

Sits at C1 on the CEFR scale

Senses: 5
Parts of speech: 2
Citations: 5
Synonyms: 1

Deep Dive

adverb

Extra meanings

With an unrestrained forward motion.
With the head first or down.

adjective

Extra meaning

Plunging downwards head foremost.

More examples

In context

You immediately rushed headlong into it!
Figures out today show the economy plunging headlong into recession.
Bumps, bruises, and scratches are often the result of their efforts to outstrip each other in the headlong race.

Quick test

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Question 1 · Quick check

She ran blank into the dark room without looking back.

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Nearby

Citations

The word in print, with each source given in full.

Their path led them past sharp cliffs, along narrow trails unknown and untrodden, past headlong boulders strewn across barren, treeless, wind-haunted heights.
1961, Norma Lorre Goodrich, “Beowulf”, in The Medieval Myths, New York: The New American Library, page 35
On sighting their prey, they check their flight and hurtle in a headlong dive to the sea.
1993, Michael Hume Jackson, Galapagos, a Natural History, page 143
Bumps, bruises, and scratches are often the result of their efforts to outstrip each other in the headlong race.
1900, James George Frazer, The Golden Bough, volume 3, page 243
[A] sharp-looking old dame, […] inhabited a "laigh [low] shop," anglicé [in English], a cellar, opening to the High-street by a strait and steep stair, at the bottom of which she sold tape, thread, needles, skeans of worsted, coarse linen cloth, and such feminine gear, to those who had the courage and skill to descend to the profundity of her dwelling, without falling headlong themselves, or throwing down any of the numerous articles which, piled on each side of the descent, indicated the profession of the trader below.
1816, [Walter Scott], chapter I, in The Antiquary. […], volume I, Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC, page 4
When his eyes were clear again, he saw the monster had passed and was rushing landward. Big iron upper-works rose out of this headlong structure, and from that twin funnels projected, and spat a smoking blast shot with fire into the air. It was the torpedo-ram, Thunder Child, steaming headlong, coming to the rescue of the threatened shipping.
1895–1897, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, “The ‘Thunder Child’”, in The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, published 1898, →OCLC, (please specify the page number(s))

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Origin

adverb

From Middle English hedlong, alteration of hedling, heedling, hevedlynge (“headlong”), assimilated to long. More at headling.

Deep Dive

adverb

adjective

More examples

Related

Quick test

She ran blank— into the dark room without looking back.

Nearby

Origin

adverb

She ran blank into the dark room without looking back.