flabby, a.
(ˈflæbɪ)
[An onomatopœic modification of the earlier flappy; the voiced ending in flab- as compared with flap- gives to the syllable a feebler effect suited to the meaning. Cf. Du. flabberen (of a breeze) to flutter; Sw. dial. fläbb the hanging underlip of an animal. With sense 2 cf. slabby.]
1. Hanging loose by its own weight, yielding to the touch and easily moved or shaken, flaccid, limp, soft; said chiefly of or with respect to flesh.
| [1598, see flappy.] 1697 Dryden Virg. Georg. iii. 780 His flabby Flanks decrease. 1740 E. Baynard Health (ed. 6) 10 Loose and flabby, wrinkled skin. 1752 H. Walpole Corr. (1837) I. 163 The town is empty, nothing in it but flabby mackerel. 1766 Smollett Trav. 165 Ducks..very fat and flabby. 1813 J. Thomson Lect. Inflam. 545 Her tongue had become yellow, swollen, and flabby. 1858 Holland Titcomb's Lett. vi. 58 Their muscles are flabby. 1865 Dickens Mut. Fr. iii. iii, This flabby lump of mortality. |
2. Of language, character, etc.: Weak, wanting ‘back-bone’; nerveless, feeble.
| 1791 Boswell Life Johnson (1831) IV. 356 note, Garrick, after listening to him for a while..turned slily to a friend, and whispered him, ‘What say you to this?—eh? Flabby, I think.’ 1855 Sat. Rev. 10 Nov. 35/2 Flabby hebdomadal drivel. 1861 Ibid. 14 Dec. 596 The flabby talk of people who are expressly told to keep their minds clear of all knowledge of the principles which it involves. 1864 Carlyle Fredk. Gt. IV. xii. viii. 181 An indolent flabby kind of creature. 1880 Standard 22 Dec., Flabby logic like this. |
3. Damp, clammy.
| c 1780 M. Monsey Let. to Mrs. Montague in J. C. Jeaffreson Bk. about Doctors II. 87 How do you stand this flabby weather? 1849 Dickens Dav. Copp. (C.D. ed.) 157 There was a flabby perspiration on the walls. |
4. Comb. a. In parasynthetic
adjs., as
flabby-breasted,
flabby-jowled,
flabby-mouthed.
| 1965 H. Gold Man who was not with It xxix. 266 A gutty, chicken-necked, *flabby-breasted manager. |
| 1932 W. Faulkner Light in August xiii. 290 *Flabbyjowled and darkcaverneyed. |
| 1905 Daily Chron. 1 June 5/7 Those blear-eyed, *flabby-mouthed swillers. |
b. With
pr. pple. forming
adj., as
flabby-looking.
| 1895 J. Ashby-Sterry Tale of Thames 43/2 A flabby-looking, unhealthy person. 1947 W. de la Mare Coll. Stories for Children 201 Rather flabby-looking mackerel. |
Hence
ˈflabbily adv., in a flabby manner.
| 1846 Worcester Flabbily, in a flabby manner. 1856 G. Meredith Shav. Shagpat 325 His tawny skin hung flabbily and his jaw drooped. |