adj., and flashily, or flashly, adv. (old: now colloquial).—Empty; showy; tawdry; insipid.
1637. MILTON, Lycidas, 123.
| Their lean and FLASHY songs | |
| Grate on their scrannel pipes of wretched straw. |
1693. CONGREVE, The Old Batchelor, Act I., sc. iv. It is oftentimes too late with some of you young, termagant, FLASHY sinners.
1719. D’URFEY, Wit and Mirth; or Pills to Purge Melancholy, ii., 127. A FLASHY town beau.
1748. T. DYCHE, A New General English Dictionary (5 ed.). FLASHY (a), vain, bragging, boasting, foolish, empty; also anything waterish and unsavoury.
1755. The World, No. 149. Whose melodious voices give every syllable (not of a lean and FLASHY, but of a fat and plump song) its just emphasis.
1830. BULWER-LYTTON, Paul Clifford, p. 13, (ed. 1854). Vy it be … the gemman vot payed you so FLASHLY.
1857. DUCANGE ANGLICUS, pseud. The Vulgar Tongue, p. 42, ‘The Leary Man.’ Your fogle you must FLASHLY tie.
1863. SPEKE, Journal of the Discovery of the Nile, p. 154. FLASHILY dressed in coloured cloths and a turban, he sat down in one of our chairs.
1864. M. E. BRADDON, Henry Dunbar, ch. v. But he evinced no bad taste in the selection of a costume. He chose no gaudy colours, or FLASHILY cut vestments.
1873. Cassell’s Magazine, Jan., p. 246, col. 2. They are rather prone to dress FLASHILY, and wear, when in full fig, no end of jewellery.
1874. M. and F. COLLINS, Frances, ch. xvii. That wild set of people Captain Heath picked up with—members of Parliament and FLASHY young women—all driving four horses I don’t know where.
1882. Century Magazine, xxvi., 295. As stones, they were cheap and FLASHY.
