a. [f. BROOD sb. + -Y1.]
† 1. Prolific; apt or inclined to breed. Now dial.
1513. Douglas, Æneis, VI. xiii. 61. The quhilk ciete … Happy and brudy of hir forcy ofspring.
1536. Bellenden, Cron. Scot., I. (1821), p. xxxiv. This herbe is sa brudy, that quhair it is anis sawin … it can nevir be distroyit. Ibid., I. v. (Jam.). The brudy spredyng of the Scottis.
1629. Boyd, Last Battell, 146 (Jam.). Strive to curbe your owne corruptions which are broodie within you.
a. 1639. W. Whateley, Prototypes, II. xxx. (1640), 97. He is broody of quarrels.
1693. J. Wallace, Orkney, 30. The Women are very Broodie and apt for Generation.
1800. A. Carlyle, Autobiog., 225. His widow, being still handsome and broody, married.
2. Of fowls: Inclined to ‘sit’ or incubate.
1523. Fitzherb., Husb., § 146. Whan they [hennes] waxe brodye.
1691. Ray, Creation, I. (1704), 186. The hen—while she is broody sits, and leads her chickens.
1859. Darwin, Orig. Spec. (1861), 236. Fowls which very rarely or never become ‘broody,’ that is, never wish to sit on their eggs.
1875. Lubbock, Orig. Civiliz., App. 498. A mongrel [fowl] that becomes broody and sits with remarkable steadiness.
