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accidentally

[ak-si-den-tl]

Example Sentences Origin

adjective

happening by chance or accident; not planned; unexpected: an accidental meeting.

nonessential; incidental; subsidiary: accidental benefits.

Music. relating to or indicating sharps, flats, or naturals.

noun

a nonessential or subsidiary circumstance, characteristic, or feature.

Music. a sign placed before a note indicating a chromatic alteration of its pitch.

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Accidentally is always a great word to know.

So is doohickey. Does it mean:

a gadget; dingus; thingumbob.

an arrangement of five objects, as trees, in a square or rectangle, one at each corner and one in the middle.

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Origin:
1350–1400; Middle English < Medieval Latin accidentālis. See accident, -al¹

Related forms

ac·ci·den·tal·ly, ac·ci·dent·ly, adverb

ac·ci·den·tal·ness, ac·ci·den·tal·i·ty, noun

non·ac·ci·den·tal, adjective, noun

non·ac·ci·den·tal·ly, adverb

non·ac·ci·den·tal·ness, noun

EXPAND

pre·ac·ci·den·tal, adjective

pre·ac·ci·den·tal·ly, adverb

pseu·do·ac·ci·den·tal, adjective

pseu·do·ac·ci·den·tal·ly, adverb

qua·si-ac·ci·den·tal, adjective

qua·si-ac·ci·den·tal·ly, adverb

un·ac·ci·den·tal, adjective

un·ac·ci·den·tal·ly, adverb

COLLAPSE

Synonyms
1. unintentional, unforeseen. Accidental, casual, fortuitous all describe something outside the usual course of events. Accidental implies occurring unexpectedly or by chance: an accidental blow. Casual describes a passing event of slight importance: a casual reference. Fortuitous is applied to events occurring without known cause, often of a fortunate or favorable nature: a fortuitous shower of meteors. It often also implies good luck or good fortune: a fortuitous choice leading to rapid advancement.

Antonyms
1. planned, contrived.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2012.
Cite This Source

Link To accidentally

Example Sentences

Open, he accidentally nudged his ball while setting up for a shot.

Professors have also accidentally shared comments with students that they meant only for fellow instructors.

The problem comes when the telomerase gene is accidentally activated in a cell in which it is supposed to be shut down.

EXPAND

Open, he accidentally nudged his ball while setting up for a shot.

Professors have also accidentally shared comments with students that they meant only for fellow instructors.

The problem comes when the telomerase gene is accidentally activated in a cell in which it is supposed to be shut down.

Juvenile swordfish and other severely depleted species are often accidentally caught by longlines.

Plant-dwelling insects are in perpetual danger of being accidentally munched on by plant-eating animals.

They suspect that a fishing vessel picked it up accidentally.

As you cut, be careful not to accidentally nip off the new buds.

After accidentally discovering an alien artifact, the space miner finds himself stranded on an asteroid, his co-workers missing.

McGill, a prominent physician of this place, accidentally shot himself yesterday while out frog shooting.

He had accidentally marked the wrong major on his online admissions.

If it accidentally kills someone on the list, all bets will be off.

Two actors playing a scene in which a guy accidentally cuts his hand while chopping fruits.

Also, pipes leading to the tanks can be accidentally ruptured.

It is made, in part, from serum from six colleagues accidentally infected in the lab.

It's a junkyard out there in space and sometimes astronauts accidentally contribute to the litter.

If you open the flip and accidentally press the up arrow key, you see that the phone starts to connect to the web.

Call to request a waiver of the late penalty if you mostly pay on time but accidentally miss a deadline one month.

I've had one rabbit die, and the other well, get sold accidentally.

If it starts to fail, the computer can crash accidentally when the power supply generates a noisy signal.

We accidentally spilled about a quarter of the grain in the sink while trying to pour it into the cloth.

You'll have to be careful you don't accidentally throw yours out with the recycling.

Any lasting damage from a drug study can scar them for life, if not accidentally kill them.

People continue to accidentally introduce species to new ranges today.

And then hitting someone in the face for accidentally stepping on your foot.

Doofenshmirtz accidentally transforms himself into a were-cow.

Many invasive species are introduced into a new region accidentally.

Indeed, in nearly all reported cases skiers or snowmobilers have been victims of avalanches accidentally provoked by themselves.

But that runs the risk of accidentally triggering a response from another atomic power, who might mistake it for a nuke.

Fourteen percent of the wasp species had been accidentally introduced to the islands over the years.

It is nice to see that they have accidentally admitted to global warming.

There is no way to measure whether voters accidentally cast ballots for the wrong candidate.

Swimming pools were fitted with ropes to allow koalas to climb out if they accidentally fall in.

The oldest accidentally preserved human ever found was the victim of a brutally efficient murder.

Underneath the tower other jumpers softened the soil with long sticks in case a diver accidentally crashed.

Nelson accidentally turned on the gas while looking after her son in their darkened apartment.

Sometimes the workers who show people how to place their fingers on the scanner accidentally scan their own fingerprints.

Discovered accidentally when someone stored milk in a stomach-canteen full of gut microbes, acids, and enzymes.

She said he accidentally fell on the22 rifle he had taken out to dispatch the groundhogs colonizing their property.

Having both inherited and accidentally hired rude people in the.

One group of soldiers accidentally started a firefight with police officers by raiding their headquarters.

Now researchers say that simply changing the type of light sticks could perhaps reduce the number of accidentally caught turtles.

If you accidentally kill someone in an auto accident, which you caused, you are not charged with murder.

Only a last-minute stroke of luck revealed how the majestic creatures were being accidentally poisoned by medicine given to cows.

New software can restore photos that have accidentally been erased and recover deliberately deleted images.

Otherwise, being walked in on accidentally is your own fault.

Several days into the survey, the scientists accidentally captured a creature in a net that fit the guide's description:.

They could not fly and so would not accidentally flutter into a golden orb weaver.

After completing the job he accidentally dropped his knife and cut a.

Now imagine you've got a customer who has been accidentally encountered in his birthday suit.

Often accidentally caught and killed in trawlers' nets in.

Battista accidentally discovered edible cellulose by leaving a solution of cellulose and water in the blender a little too.

Safe-curved blade design makes it hard to accidentally hack off unsuspecting toes.

Three kids are accidentally sent on the underwater adventure of a lifetime in this animated story for the whole family.

Sometimes the chalk accidentally makes the sound, too.

The other risk is that something will escape accidentally.

Invasive species or non-native species can be introduced accidentally or intentionally.

Like the person who accidentally runs over a toddler.

It is as painful as accidentally pouring super hot coffee in my mouth.

Many bomblets may not explode on contact, and later can be accidentally triggered by civilians".

The letters are accidentally returned to them with other materials.

Another bled to death after accidentally chopping his foot with an axe.

He flung up his hands, accidentally grazing two of his fingers along the shark's teeth.

When those dogs mate purposely or accidentally with breeds outside of those breeds, their offspring may be less allergenic.

Having witnessed a drunk man accidentally kill himself by touching a live electric.

He said he accidentally used a bat intended for batting practice.

The result will simply be more guns around campus, which increases the likelihood that some will go off accidentally.

Anna can be seen walking down the catwalk whereupon she accidentally drops a pistol on the floor.

They must have accidentally been moved from another thread.

Heintz made his findings almost accidentally while developing new methods for studying methylation in mouse neurons.

Sometimes low culture accidentally does more than the works that start out pretentiously intending to be high culture.

Like all deniers lakota accidentally on purpose mistakes energy with nameplate capacity.

He has accidentally sat on the world's deadliest snake, battled drug lords with dart.

But now it is safe from prying eyes and people who might accidentally damage the plant.

Workers on the barge further screen the collected algae for any accidentally collected marine life.

As such, the machine has accidentally probed subatomic scales, revealing the limits on the fabric of space-time.

These so-called false memories can be implanted intentionally or accidentally through poor questioning methods.

Label each bin clearly so employees do not accidentally mix materials.

Instead she ended up accidentally disabling telomerase in an experiment and noticed an unexpected outcome:.

Psychology has a long history of regarding pleasure and reward as the same thing, accidentally or not.

Fishermen hunt dolphins for catfish bait, he says, and they also kill them accidentally in their gill nets.

One of the women accidentally stepped in the water and muddied up the pool where the fish are.

These can become enormous-several inches thick-and if accidentally cut, would result in rapid blood loss”.

These can become enormous-several inches thick-and if accidentally cut, would result in rapid blood loss.

COLLAPSE

Collins

World English Dictionary

accidental (ˌæksɪˈdɛnt^əl)

—*adj*
1.	occurring by chance, unexpectedly, or unintentionally
2.	nonessential; incidental
3.	music denoting sharps, flats, or naturals that are not in the key signature of a piece
4.	logic (of a property) not essential; contingent

—n
5.	an incidental, nonessential, or supplementary circumstance, factor, or attribute
6.	music a symbol denoting a sharp, flat, or natural that is not a part of the key signature

acci'dentally

—*adv*

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
Cite This Source

Etymonline

Word Origin & History

accidentally

late 14c., "non-essentially," from accidental, from Fr. accidental, from M.L. accidentalis, from L. accidens (gen. accidentis); see accident. Meaning "unintentionally" is recorded from 1580s; phrase accidentally on purpose is recorded from 1862.

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Matching Quote

"I will not adopt that ungenerous and impolitic custom so common with novel writers, of degrading by their contemptuous censure the very performances, to the number of which they are themselves adding—joining with their greatest enemies in bestowing the harshest epithets on such works, and scarcely ever permitting them to be read by their own heroine, who, if she accidentally take up a novel, is sure to turn over its insipid leaves with disgust."

-Jane Austen

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