Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adverb Without a doubt; certainly.
  • adverb In fact; in reality.
  • interjection Used to express surprise, skepticism, or irony.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • In fact; in reality; in truth: used emphatically, or as noting a concession or admission; or interjectionally, as an expression of surprise; or interrogatively, for the purpose of obtaining confirmation: as, do you believe it? yes, indeed; indeed! that is surprising; indeed? I can hardly believe it.
  • [Originally written separately as two words, as still when an adjective, as very, qualifies the noun.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adverb In reality; in truth; in fact; verily; truly; -- used in a variety of senses. Esp.: (a) Denoting emphasis. (b) Denoting concession or admission. (c) Denoting surprise.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adverb modal truly; in fact; actually
  • adverb degree, after the adjective modified In fact.
  • interjection indicates emphatic agreement

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adverb (used as an interjection) an expression of surprise or skepticism or irony etc.
  • adverb in truth (often tends to intensify)

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English in dede, in fact : in, in; see in + dede, deed, fact; see deed.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English indede, equivalent to in- +‎ deed (similar to in fact). Compare also Dutch inderdaad ("indeed") and German in der Tat ("indeed"). More at in, deed.

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Examples

Comments

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  • See: Little, Omar.

    December 6, 2006

  • This single word phrase is an excellent all-purpose response in all manner of situations. It can make you sound like you've given much more thought to your noncommittal answer than you actually did, and it can subtly express a dry, mocking agreement with another's stupidity. I frequently say this to my students.

    January 14, 2007

  • Little, Omar -- InDEED.

    January 31, 2007

  • I use this word perhaps more than any other in my vocabulary.

    May 23, 2007

  • “Emilie taught me that when we curse, if you say ‘indeed’ afterwards, it makes it more civilized.”

    —Veronica Varlow, source and demonstration

    February 11, 2010

  • Bullshit indeed.

    February 11, 2010

  • By the way, during the concert on February 8, 2010 in Berlin (:-D) they once used “teetotaling”. It might have even been somewhat of a paronomasia, for there is a lot of tea in the air during the show, but I don’t think it was punnily connoted in its immediate sentence context (which I can’t recall, unfortunately).

    February 11, 2010