From lone + -ly, or from an apheretic shortening of alonely.

• (RP) IPA: /ˈləʊn.li/
• (America) IPA: /ˈloʊn.li/

lonely (comparative lonelier, superlative loneliest)

1. Unhappy because of feeling isolated from contact with other people.
2. (of a, place or time) Unfrequented by people; desolate.
   • 1906, Lord Dunsany [i.e., Edward Plunkett, 18th Baron of Dunsany], Time and the Gods‎, London: William Heineman, →OCLC ↗, page 2 ↗:

     Only to those to whom in lonely passes in the night the gods have spoken, leaning through the stars, to those that have heard the voices of the gods above the morning or seen Their faces bending above the sea, only to those hath it been given to see Sardathrion, to stand where her pinnacles gathered together in the night fresh from the dreams of gods.

3. (of a, person) Without companions; solitary.

• (dejected) lonesome
• (unfrequented by people) desolate, desert, empty, unpeopled, unpopulated
• (without companions) solitary, alone, unaccompanied

• lone
• loneliness

• French: seul
• German: einsam, alleinig
• Italian: solo, solitario, malinconico
• Portuguese: solitário
• Russian: одино́кий
• Spanish: solitario

• French: désert, abandonné
• German: abgeschieden, einsam, öde, verlassen
• Italian: desolato, isolato
• Portuguese: isolado
• Russian: одино́кий
• Spanish: desolado, desierto