a. Now rare or Obs. [f. WHORE sb. + -ISH1.]
1. Having the character of a whore; addicted to whoredom; lewd, unchaste (of a woman; rarely of a man).
1560. Bible (Geneva), Prov. vi. 26. Because of the whoorish woman a man is broght to a morsel of bread. Ibid., Ezek. xvi. 30. Ye worke of a presumpteous whorish woman.
1611. Coryat’s Crudities, Panegyr. Verses g 2 b. He knew and felt the whores, yet was not whorish.
1624. Davenport, City Night-cap, I. i. What plague can transcend A whorish wife, and a perfidious friend!
1632. Lithgow, Trav., IX. 382. Whoorish boyes.
1675. South, Serm., Judges viii. 34, 35 (1697), I. 509. Joseph … a poor … Stranger, languishing in Durance upon the false accusations of a lying, insolent whorish Woman!
b. Belonging to or characteristic of a whore; meretricious; lewd, unchaste (of action, etc.).
1552. Huloet, Hooryshe…, or perteynynge to a hoore, meretricius.
1556. Olde, Antichrist, 203. Men geuen to their paunche and hoorishe lustes.
1606. Shaks., Tr. & Cr., IV. i. 63. You like a letcher, out of whorish loynes, Are pleas’d to breede out your inheritors.
1761. Rec. Elgin (New Spald. Club, 1903), I. 198. Barbara Reid for whorish practices expelled the burgh.
2. fig., esp. in religious and controversial use (often = idolatrous): cf. WHORE sb. 2.
1535. Coverdale, Ezek. vi. 9. That whorish and vnfaithfull herte of theirs, wherwith they runne awaye fro me.
1538. Bale, Thre Lawes, C ii b. Regarde not the pope, nor yet hys whorysh kyngedom.
c. 1586. C’tess Pembroke, Ps. LXXIII. vii. They all shall be undone, Who leaving thee to whoorish idolls run.
1680. R. L’Estrange, Citt & Bumpkin (ed. 3), 16. The Church of England … is not altogether the Whore of Babylon, though a good deal Whorish.
1696. Brookhouse, Temple Opened, 47. The Bride has a Husband … sufficient to maintain her against all Whorish, Beastly or Satannical Usurpations.
1711. Steele, Spect., No. 82, ¶ 3. Jack has a whorish unresisting Good-nature, which makes him incapable of having a Property in any thing.
Hence Whorishly adv.; Whorishness.
1538. Elyot, Dict., Meretricie, *hoorishely.
1589. Nashe, Martin Marprelate, Wks. (Grosart), I. 108. Howe whorishlie Scriptures are alleaged by them, I will discouer … in another new worke.
16[?]. Middleton, etc., Old Law, IV. ii. Are you so whorishly provided?
1755. Johnson, Meretriciously, whorishly; after the manner of whores.
1546. Bale, Engl. Votaries, I. 18. Marke how abhominable *whoryshnesse … is auaunced of that whorysh Rome churche, to the great blemyshynge of Godly marryage.
1691. Wood, Ath. Oxon., II. 706. The said Anne was … for her whorishness lawfully divorced.
1727. Bailey, vol. II., Meretriciousness, whorishness.
