Note 349 – Is it spelt accidentally or accidently?

Before you read on, which do you think is the correct spelling: accidentally or accidently?  I hope no one spotted the accidental misspelling of the word accidentally in yesterday’s post (Note 348 – Accidentally overwriting blog posts) before I changed it.  This is apparently a commonly misspelt word of which I am guilty of unfortunately (not anymore though!).

Although I now know that accidentally is the correct spelling, it niggles me that the incorrect spelling ‘accidently’ has (over the years) been accepted as a variant.  Some dictionaries show both just because the word proves to be popular, but this doesn’t make it right.  A member on English forums.com suggests picking a dictionary and sticking to it with all your words and also adds that accidentally is “more right, if there is such a thing”.

Tip for remembering the spelling

English for Students website says that an easy way to remember this spelling is to remember the spelling of accidental. You just need to add ‘-ly’ (just remember not to add ‘-ly’ to accident or you’ll end up with *accidently* which is incorrect).

-ally suffixes

A similar word with an ‘-ally’ suffix is incidentally.

Dictionary links

Merriam Webster online dictionary shows both accidentally and accidently
Oxford Dictionaries online shows only accidentally
Cambridge Dictionaries online shows only accidentally

I think I’ll go with accidentally!

Until tomorrow…

Sandra
www.sandramadeira.com
17 days of My Writing Challenge to go