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clayey

adj
/ˈkleɪ(j)i/UK/ˈkleɪi/US

Etymology

From Middle English cleyy, cleyye (“clayish; messy; unclean”) [and other forms], either: * from Middle English clei, cley (“clay; clayey soil; clay-containing material used as mortar or plaster”) [and other forms] + -i (suffix forming adjectives); clei, cley is derived from Old English clǣġ (“clay”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *gleh₁y-, *gley- (“to smear; to stick; glue; putty”); or * from Old English clǣig (“clayey”), from clǣġ (“clay”) (see above) + -iġ (suffix forming adjectives). The English word is equivalent to clay + -ey (suffix forming adjectives with the sense ‘having the quality of’), with the -e- included to avoid the occurrence of -yy. Sense 4 (“of the human body, as contrasted with the soul”) may allude to the biblical account of God creating man from earth; see Genesis 2:7 (King James Version; spelling modernized): “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul.”

  1. inherited from clǣig — “clayey”
  2. inherited from *gleh₁y-✻
  3. inherited from clǣġ — “clay”
  4. inherited from clei
  5. inherited from cleyy

Definitions

  1. Composed of clay or containing (much) clay

    Composed of clay or containing (much) clay; clayish.

    • The shores of the rivers and creeks are chiefly planted with coffee, to the distance of about 30 miles from the sea; thence 30 miles farther up, the soil becomes clayey and more fit for sugar[-]canes.
    • She had walked over rotted, decaying, splintered planks covered with clayey soil: […]

  2. Covered or dirtied with clay.

    • Wheat-fields, one would think, cannot come to grow untilled; no man made clayey, or made weary thereby;—unless machinery will do it?

  3. Resembling clay

    Resembling clay; claylike, clayish.

    • Death, grim Death, will fold / Me, in his leaden Arms, and preſs me cloſe / To his cold clayie Breaſt: […]
  4. ›+ 1 more definition

    1. Of the human body, as contrasted with the soul

      Of the human body, as contrasted with the soul; bodily, human, mortal.

      • [A]mid these tombs, / Cold as their clayey tenants, know, my heart / Must never grow to stone!
      • To low estate of clayey creature, / See, I bring the beggar's meed, / Nutriment beyond the need!

The neighborhood

Derived

clayeyness, nonclayey

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for clayey. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA