jahrlich

Jahrlich is a less common variant spelling of the German word jährlich, which means annually or yearly. In modern standard German, jährlich is the preferred form; jahrlich appears primarily in older texts, where umlauts were unavailable, in typographic constraints, or as a misspelling in OCR and data entry.

Etymology and orthography: The term is formed from Jahr (year) + -lich, a suffix used to form adjectives and corresponding adverbs. The umlaut in jähr- signals a distinct vowel quality compared with the unmarked jah-, but jahrlich lacks the umlaut and therefore is treated as non-standard in contemporary usage.

Usage: As an adverb, jährlich denotes frequency per year, as in Die Veranstaltung findet jährlich statt. As an attributive adjective, the related form is jährliche. In modern writing, jährlich is the correct form; jahrlich may appear in historical texts or as a typographical error.

Surname: Jahrlich is also found as a surname in German-speaking regions. It is relatively rare and there are no widely known figures associated with it.

See also: jährlich, Jahr.