lubberly

lubberly

English

Etymology

lubber +‎ -ly

Adjective

lubberly (comparative more lubberly, superlative most lubberly)

1. Clumsy and stupid; resembling a lubber (an inexperienced person).
   • Shakespeare

     a great lubberly boy

   • 1693, Thomas Urquhart, translation of Gargantua by Rabelais, Chapter XX:

     Ponocrates and Eudemon burst out in a laughing so heartily, that they had almost split with it, and given up the ghost, in rendering their souls to God: even just as Crassus did, seeing a lubberly ass eat thistles;

2. Lacking in seamanship; of or suitable to a landlubber who is new to being at sea and unfamiliar with the ways of a sailor.
   • 1848, James Fenimore Cooper, "Captain Spike, Or The Islets of the Gulf", in Bentley's Miscellany , page 19:

     "Do not use such a lubberly expression, my dear Rose, if you respect your father's profession. On a vessel is a new-fangled Americanism, that is neither fish, flesh, nor red-herring, as we sailors say,— neither English nor Greek."

Adverb

lubberly (comparative more lubberly, superlative most lubberly)

1. In the manner of a landlubber.
   • 1839, Matthew Henry Barker, Hamilton King , page 105:

     I'm not ignorant of these matters, having been many years at sea—and seamen, you must know, are curious in knots; I cannot endure to see anything done lubberly.