a. Also 6–7 tygrish, 6, 9 tigrish. [f. TIGER sb. + -ISH1.]
1. Like, or like that of a tiger; esp. of the nature or having the qualities of the tiger; cruel, bloodthirsty, fierce, relentless.
1573. L. Lloyd, Marrow of Hist. (1653), 265. Her cruel and Tigrish heart.
a. 1586. Sidney, Arcadia (1622), 467. Were thy eyes so stonie, thy breast so tygrish?
1604. Earl Stirling, Aurora, xci. And with my ashes glut thy Tygrish heart.
1846. Blackw. Mag., LIX. 406. [Their] craving for possession is treacherous and tigerish.
1887. Miss E. Money, Lit. Dutch Maid. (1888), 95. A wild-cat skin with handsome tigerish stripes.
1909. Daily Chron., 18 Feb., 7/4. There are many predatory and tigerish plants, of which the sundew is a notable example.
b. Loud, flashy: cf. TIGER sb. 7.
1831. [see 3].
1836. New Monthly Mag., XLVIII. 458. Whatever deviates from the unique standard of gentlemen’s dressing is tigerish.
1853. Lytton, My Novel, VI. xx. Nothing could be more vagrant,… and, to use a slang word, tigrish, than his whole air.
2. Abounding in or infested with tigers.
1819. Sporting Mag., IV. 175. They had crossed again Firoze’s canal, which appeared very tigerish.
1851. Fraser’s Mag., XLIV. 19. Through the thickest and most tigerish section of the jungle.
3. Comb., as tigerish-looking.
1831. Society, I. 43. A tigerish looking man planted himself where he could very rudely stare at Miss Delamere.
Hence Tigerishly adv., Tigerishness.
1862. Caledonian Mercury, 1 Aug., 3/3. Others [women prisoners] will yell, and kick, and bite, and are only to be kept quiet by handcuffs and superior force, and by the guards in the outer yards called in to tame their *tigerishness.
1869. Daily News, 12 June. A well known plunger, whose attendant tiger is a miracle of tigerishness.
1863. Wisconsin State Jrnl., 28 April, 2/1. Her strong, hard, cruel nature fought *tigerishly up again from the horrible blow of my news.
1879. J. Todhunter, Alcestis, 125. This sudden flood of fearful rapture, which Tugs my heart tigerishly.
