[f. ANATOMY by aphæresis of an-, due to its being taken for the indef. article, as, by similar treatment of a-, the forms natomy, nathomy, were also in early use. In the concrete and popular senses of the word this contracted form was formerly quite established; but is now only illiterate or jocular.]
1. An anatomical preparation, an anatomized body; esp. a skeleton.
1728. Gay, Beggar’s Op., II. i. He is among the Otamys at Surgeon’s Hall.
1755. Smollett, Quix. (1803), IV. 148. My bones … will be taken up smooth, and white, and bare as an atomy.
1823. J. F. Cooper, Pioneer, xiii. 146. His sides … looked just like an atomy, ribs and all.
2. An emaciated or withered living body, a walking skeleton.
1597. Shaks., 2 Hen. IV., V. iv. 33. [Quarto; folio 1623 has ‘anatomy’] You starved blood-hound!… Thou atomy, thou!
1681. R. Knox, Hist. Ceylon, 124. Consumed to an Atomy, having nothing left but skin to cover his Bones.
1864. Mrs. Lloyd, Ladies Polcarrow, 149. ‘We should have wasted to atomies if we had a-stayed in that terrible bad place any longer,’ said Ursula.
b. fig. or transf. of things.
1848. Dickens, Dombey, 86. Withered atomies of teaspoons.
