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Showing results for pursy. Search instead for pursier.

pursy

1 American  
[pur-see] / ˈpɜr si /

adjective

pursier, pursiest
  1. short-winded, especially from corpulence or fatness.

  2. corpulent or fat.


pursy 2 American  
[pur-see] / ˈpɜr si /

adjective

pursier, pursiest
  1. vain about one's wealth; purse-proud.


pursy British  
/ ˈpɜːsɪ /

adjective

  1. short-winded

  2. archaic fat; overweight

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Word Forms


Etymology

Origin of pursy1

1400–50; late Middle English purcy, variant of Middle English pursif < Anglo-French porsif, variant of Old French polsif, derivative ( see -ive) of polser to pant, heave. See push

Origin of pursy2

First recorded in 1545–55; purse + -y 1


Vocabulary lists containing pursy

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

See Examples For:

"For in the fatness of these pursy times/ Virtue itself of vice must pardon beg," says Hamlet to Gertrude.

From Time Magazine Archive

He began to get pursy and red-faced, and was clicking it off with his fifth set of young fellows.

From In Our Town by Frederic Rodrigo Gruger

On the other side of her was an individual in a civic chain, whose fat, pursy, apoplectic appearance, and nose of the colour of an Orleans plum, thoroughly realised my mental picture of the Bailie.

From Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, No. 382, October 1847 by Various

I can remember your letters in their fat pursy envelopes.

From The Passionate Elopement by Compton MacKenzie

There was a pursy sac-like body, ending in a head with staring, lidless eyes and a great black beak that looked strong enough to shear sheet steel.

From Devil Crystals of Arret by Hal K. Wells

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