challengingly

the word 'challengingly' is a modern english formation built upon the noun and verb 'challenge'. the core morpheme 'challenge' entered english via anglo-norman and old french, tracing back to the latin calumnia, which carried the sense of a false accusation or deceptive claim. this evolved in medieval contexts to denote a call to combat or a dispute, eventually broadening to its modern sense of a test or demanding task. the suffix '-ing' transforms it into an adjective ('challenging'), describing something that poses such a test, and the adverbial suffix '-ly' then modifies this quality to describe the manner in which an action is performed. thus, the literal construction 'in a testing manner' logically extends to its abstract meaning of doing something in a way that is difficult or demanding.

Structure: challenge (to test) + ing (adjective suffix) + ly (adverb suffix) challenge (from old french chalenge, chalonge, meaning 'accusation, dispute', from latin calumnia meaning 'trickery, false claim'); ing (from old english -ende, -inge, forming present participles and adjectives); ly (from old english -līce, forming adverbs from adjectives).