Etymology: < even adj.¹ + -ly suffix¹. Compare Old Icelandic jafnligr equal, fair, Gothic ibnaleiks of the same body. Compare also Middle Dutch evenlijc , Middle Low German ēvenlīk , Old High German ebanlīh (Middle High German ebenlīch ), all in the senses ‘like, equal’, although here the second element should probably be taken as derived from the (related) Germanic base of ylike adj., with loss of the medial element; compare Old English efengelīc, in the same sense.In Old English the prefixed form ge-efenlic equal (compare y- prefix) is also attested.

Etymology: < even adj.¹ + -ly suffix². Compare even adv., evenly adj.Compare Old High German ebanlīcho (Middle High German ebenlīche ), Old Icelandic jafnliga , Old Swedish iämlika (Swedish jämlika ), all in sense ‘equally’. In Middle English it is not always easy to distinguish forms of evenly adv. from collocations of (related) even adv. and like adv., as there is still significant overlap between forms of -ly suffix² and forms of like adv. Scribal word division is not always a reliable guide, and word division in Middle English examples frequently reflects editorial choices of modern editors of texts, who do not in all instances agree. This difficulty in particular affects the evidence at sense 5c, where quots. c1425, a1475, and a1500 could alternatively be interpreted as showing even like as (compare even adv. 5a and like as at like adj., adv., conj., and prep. Phrases 1a(b)).