[f. WEED sb.1 + -Y1]
1. Full of, abounding or overgrown with, weeds.
c. 1420. Pallad. on Husb., Tab. 219. Lond, weet, wodi, wedi, or stony, to remedie.
1596. Spenser, F. Q., IV. x. 55. But I … Like warie Hynd within the weedie soyle, For no intreatie would forgoe so glorious spoyle.
1611. Bible, Jer. xlix. 21. The noise thereof was heard in the Red [marg. weedy] Sea.
a. 1631. Donne, Lett. to Persons of Honour (1651), 50. A sullen weedy lake, where I could not have so much as exercise for my swimming.
1707. Mortimer, Husb., 100. If Wheat is weedy it must lie upon the Gravel.
1767. A. Young, Farmer’s Lett. to People, 261. Dividing the field in such a manner as to give each method a fair proportion of the weedy and clean parts.
1828. Davy, Salmonia, 47. The fish here are large, and the river weedy, so you must take care of your fish and your tackle.
1852. Mrs. Stowe, Uncle Tom’s C., xxxii. The waggon rolled up a weedy gravel-walk.
1914. ‘Ian Hay,’ Knt. on Wheels, xiv. The garden was weedy and the lawn unshaven.
fig. 1579. Spenser, Sheph. Cal., Dec., 122. I haue Nought reaped but a weedye crop of care.
1628. Prynne, Brief Surv. Cozens, 15. The infallibilitie of the Church of Rome, from whose weedie Garden, this Garland of Deuotion hath beene gathered.
1859. Meredith, R. Feverel, xiii [x]. A sad downfall if we forget what human nature, in its green weedy Spring, is composed of.
1892. Daily Tel., 31 Aug., 5/4. [The library] of the Church House is still scrappy, weedy and incomplete.
2. Of the nature of or resembling a weed; made or consisting of weeds.
1602. Shaks., Ham., IV. vii. 175. When downe the weedy Trophies, and her selfe, Fell in the weeping Brooke.
1610. G. Fletcher, Christ’s Tri., I. l. Let … nettles, kixe, and all the weedie nation, With emptie elders grow, sad signes of desolation.
1733. W. Ellis, Chiltern & Vale Farm., 349. The Sheep … in quest of their weedy Food.
1753. Dodsley, Publ. Virtue, I. ii. 94. His new machine; form’d to exterminate The weedy race.
1881. Grant Allen, Evolutionist at Large, 44. Thus the crowfoot, too, cannot blossom to any purpose below the water:… only those lucky individuals whose chance lot it was to grow a little taller and weedier than the rest, and so overtop the stream, have handed down their race to our time.
1885. L’pool Daily Post, 30 June, 4/6. Grasping in their tired little hands the weedy spoils of the hedgerow.
fig. 1819. H. Busk, Vestriad, II. 84. The brawny Tritons, with their weedy hair.
1835. Waterworth, Exam. Distinctive Princ. Protestantism, 9. These weedy prejudices never will be torn up.
1874. Burnand, My Time, xxvi. 238. A long-legged gentleman with weedy whiskers.
1888. D. C. Murray, Weaker Vessel, xiv. Some of them are clever in a way; rooted fools by nature, who bear a weedy little blossom of wit, and suppose themselves to flower all over.
3. Having a taste or tang of weeds.
1892. J. M. Walsh, Tea, 107. The liquor [of Neilgherry] is thin, muddy and rank or ‘weedy’ in flavour.
4. colloq. (Cf. WEED sb.1 5.) a. Of animals, esp. horses and hounds: Lean, leggy, loose-bodied, and lacking in strength and mettle.
1800. Sporting Mag., XV. 107. The poor, slight, weedy, spindle-shanked stock of brood mares.
1854. Surtees, Handley Cr., xxxviii. (1901), II. 15. He rode a weedy chestnut.
1865. Morley, Mod. Characteristics, 11. A very shabby old brougham drawn by a pair of very weedy horses.
1877. Stables, Pract. Kennel Guide, 37. Weedy.—A very expressive word, as applied to a dog who looks leggy, thin, badly-bred, and apparently going to seed.
1888. ‘R. Boldrewood,’ Robbery under Arms, xi. We drafted out all the worst and weediest of the cattle.
b. Of persons: Unhealthily tall and thin; lanky and wanting physical vigor; also, weakly, of poor physique.
1852. Surtees, Sponge’s Sp. Tour, xxi. ‘Nice size, too,’ continued he,… ‘plenty of substance … (puff)…. Hate a weedy woman—fifteen two and a half—that’s to say, five feet four, ’s plenty of height for a woman.’
a. 1865. Mrs. Gaskell, Wives & Dau., viii. Grace … is looking rather pale and weedy.
1892. Nation, 21 April, 295/3. In order to fill the ranks large numbers of weedy men have been enlisted.
5. Comb., as weedly-haired, -looking adjs.
1819. Keats, Lines to Fanny, 36. That monstrous region, whose dull rivers pour, Ever from their sordid urns unto the shore, Unown’d of any weedy-haired gods.
1854. Whyte-Melville, Gen. Bounce, vii. His fastidious taste cannot but admit that there are ‘some weedy-looking ones among ’em.’
1861. Hughes, Tom Brown at Oxf., xxxiii. Tom thought them weedy-looking animals.
1866. Treas. Bot., 139/2. Various genera of coarse weedy-looking plants.
