howsomever, adv. Now dial. or vulgar.
(ˌhaʊsəˈmɛvə(r))
Also, south. dial. howsomdever.
[A parallel formation to howsoever, of earlier appearance, with the conj. sum, som (= Da., Sw. som, ON. sem as, that) instead of so.]
† 1. a. Introducing a subordinate clause: In whatever manner; = however 1. b. Although; = however 1 c. Obs.
| a 1300 Cursor M. 2339 Nu at þe erth nu at þe lift, or hu sumeuer [v.rr. hou sum euir, how sim euer] þou will þe scift. c 1420 Avow. Arth. xxiv, Then to-gedur schulle we goe How-sumeuyr hit cheuis. c 1489 Caxton Sonnes of Aymon x. 270 How somever the game gooth. 1560 J. Daus tr. Sleidane's Comm. 297 How someuer the matter was. 1601 Shakes. All's Well i. iii. 56 How somere their hearts are seuer'd in Religion, their heads are both one. |
2. Nevertheless; yet: = however 3. Now chiefly U.S. colloq.
| 1562 Turner Herbal ii. 70 b, It is playn that he had Dioscorides howsomeuer. 1728 Vanbr. & Cib. Prov. Husb. ii. 27 But howsomdever, we'st ta' the best care we can. 1741 Richardson Pamela (1824) I. 64 Howsomever, it will do you no good to make this known. 1822 Scott Pirate xxxiv, Howsomdever, I object nothing to Captain Cleveland. 1852 C. W. H[oskins] Talpa 135, I shall keep you to your promise, Sir, howsomever. 1861 Hughes Tom Brown at Oxf. xliv, Howsumdever, as your countrymen say, I shall have a shy at him. 1896 ‘M. Rutherford’ Clara Hopgood xxiii. 215 He allus begins to argue with me. Howsomever, arguing isn't everything. 1929 H. W. Odum in A. Dundes Mother Wit (1973) 183 Howsomever, hard times in American camps whut I'm talkin' about. 1933 E. E. Cummings Let. 26 May (1969) 123, I fear that naught will compare with domesticity, howsomeever. 1939 Amer. Speech XIV. 128 The great drive for ‘correctness’ of the later eighteenth and early nineteenth did succeed in branding as ‘vulgarisms’ such hitherto acceptable forms as..howsomever, mought, sarvent, [etc.]. |