adj. and adv. (old colloquial).—An ironical inversion or perversion of a popular epithet of commendation and approval.
1600. SHAKESPEARE, Much Ado about Nothing, iv. 1. Talk with a man out at a window! A PROPER saying!
1664. PEPYS, Diary, 24 June. I was PROPERLY confounded. Ibid., 14 July. All … was most PROPERLY false, and nothing like it true.
1843–4. HALIBURTON (‘Sam Slick’), The Attaché, xxvi. Father … gave me a wipe … that knocked me over…. It hurt me PROPERLY.
TO MAKE ONESELF PROPER, verb. phr. (colloquial).—To adorn; to TITTIVATE (q.v.).
