[f. BONE sb. + -Y1.]
1. Of, pertaining to, of the nature of bone or bones; consisting or made of bones.
a. 1535. More, Wks. (1557), 77. Ye lothely figure of our dead bony bodies biten away ye flesh.
1607. Topsell, Four-f. Beasts, 91. A certain bony substance.
1804. Abernethy, Surg. Observ., 103. Bony matter was deposited.
1842. Prichard, Nat. Hist. Man, 116. The bony structure of the head.
2. Abounding in bones; having large or prominent bones; big-boned.
1598. Sylvester, Du Bartas (1621), 227. A lean, bare, bonny face [of a horse].
1726. Thomson, Winter, 394. Bony, and gaunt, and grim.
1836. Dickens, Pickw., v. A tall bony woman—straight all the way down.
Mod. Neck of mutton is a very bony joint.
3. Comb., as bony-skeletoned; also bony-hoof (see quot.); bony-pike, a ganoid fish inhabiting rivers and lakes in America.
1768. Croker, etc. Dict. Arts & Sc., II. Bony Hoof is a round bony swelling, growing on the very top of a horse’s hoof, which is always caused by some blow or bruise.
1848. Carpenter, Zool., § 572. The Lepidosteus or Bony Pike … has many of the characters of the Pike, with the structure of the head of the Herring.
1871. Hartwig, Subterr. W., ii. 13. Any bony-skeletoned fish of our days.
