full well

English

Etymology

From Middle English fol wel, fulwel, from Old English ful wel, equivalent to full +‎ well. Compare Old Norse all-vel (“full well”).

Adverb

full well (not comparable)

1. Very well
   • 15th c., “[The Creation]”, in Wakefield Mystery Plays; Re-edited in George England, Alfred W. Pollard, editors, The Towneley Plays (Early English Text Society Extra Series; LXXI), London: […] Oxford University Press, 1897, →OCLC, page 5, lines 120–121:

     He is so fayre, withoutten les, / he semys full well to sytt on des.

     He is so fair, without any limit; his appearance shows well when he sits on the dais.

   • 1829, Charles Burroughs, Memoirs and select papers of Horace B. Morse, Miller and Brewster, pages 83–87:

     Besides, there is always a tendency—indeed an interest—to take on what one knows full well.

   • 2006. Nadia Yassine. Full Sails Ahead. Justice and Spirituality Publications. page 2.

     He knows full well that I don't like that club.

   • 2017 November 16, Bret Stephens, “Steve Bannon Is Bad for the Jews”, in The New York Times‎, archived from the original on 18 November 2017:

     It also means that when a right-wing Jewish group such as the ZOA chooses to overlook Bannon’s well-documented links to anti-Semitic white nationalists, it puts itself on a moral par with J.V.P. Bannon is the man who expressly called Breitbart News “the platform for the alt-right,” knowing full-well the toxic range of opinion encompassed by the term.

Usage notes

Full was formerly used as an adverb in English. This has largely been replaced by fully, but full well remains in common usage, almost always modifying the verb to know. It is sometimes modified to fully well, though this may be seen as incorrect or a hypercorrection.

See also

• for a fact

References

• Brians, Paul. Common Errors in English Usage. Williams, James Co. 2009.