scoury

English

Etymology 1

From a dialectal sense of scour, "rain shower", from Old Norse skúr (“shower”), + -y.

Adjective

scoury

  1. Showery, marked by intermittent rain showers and wind.
    • 1900, Henrietta Keddie, Logan's loyalty, by Sarah Tytler, page 211:
      '... scoury (tempestuous) night.'
    • 1910, One Hundred Choice Selections, page 204:
      "... scoury night," he said, as he looked up into the dark, portentous sky.
    • 1951, Chambers's Edinburgh Journal:
      ... scoury sky […]

Etymology 2

From scour (“suffer diarrhea”) +‎ -y.

Adjective

scoury

  1. Suffering from scouring (diarrhea).
    • 1980, The New Farm:
      ... scoury calves sometimes die. As with so many livestock disorders, prevention is the name of the game. At one time every calf I brought on the farm caught a wicked brand of scours. Evidently, previously purchased baby bovines had […]
    • 1916, American Breeder, page 4:
      ... scoury, weak, drawn up, and unpromising. I still continued to feed the cows heavily because I wanted them to grow the calves well. But I couldn't get the calves to do any good, […]
  2. Shabby.
    • 1876, James Moir Porteous, Brethren in the Keelhowes: Brethrenism Tested by the Word of God, page 171:
      ... [the] scoury-looking fellow I saw you speaking to at the bridge-end that day of our Sacrament was one of that kind of folk?
    • 1977, Harvard University. Library, Harvard Library Bulletin:
      ... scoury coat, ...
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