on only a few occasions; rarely; infrequently; not often: We seldom see our old neighbors anymore.
adjective
rare; infrequent.
Origin of seldom
First recorded before 900; Middle English; Old English seldum, variant of seldan; cognate with German selten, Gothic silda-
historical usage of seldom
The adverb seldom has several spellings in Old English, among them seldan, seldon, seldun, and seldum. The last form is an innovation modeled on the dative plurals of nouns used as adverbs, for example Old English hwīlum “at times, sometimes,” the source of the archaic English whilom, from the noun hwīl “a space of time, an indefinite time, a while.” Old English seldan (but not the spelling seldum ) corresponds to Old Frisian sielden, Middle Low German and Middle Dutch selden, and German selten.
scarcely, sometimes, occasionally, sporadically, rarely, hardly, every now and then, from time to time, irregularly, little, on and off, once in a while, uncommonly, unusually, hardly ever, once in a blue moon, scarcely ever, whimsically