lathery

English

Etymology

lather +‎ -y

Adjective

lathery (comparative more lathery, superlative most lathery)

1. Resembling or covered in lather.

   Synonyms: foamy, frothy

   This new shaving cream isn't as lathery as the old stuff: there just aren't as many bubbles to be had.

   • 1824, James Atkinson, “Peer Mahommud; The Moralist,” stanza 51, in The City of Palaces, Calcutta: Government Gazette Press, p. 128,^[1]

     Thus rapidly my little tale advances,

     And now we come to him, who lives to shave!

     The lathery Knight of Razors, not of lances,

     And without question more a fool than knave.

   • 1906, E. Nesbit, The Railway Children, Chapter 7,^[2]

     “Oh, no!” said Bobbie, greatly shocked; “you don’t rub muslin. You put the boiled soap in the hot water and make it all frothy-lathery—and then you shake the muslin and squeeze it, ever so gently, and all the dirt comes out. […] ”

   • 1931, Langston Hughes, “People without Shoes” in I Wonder As I Wander, New York: Hill and Wang, 1993, p. 28,^[3]

     They wash their clothes in running streams with lathery weeds—too poor to buy soap.

   • 1957, James Agee, A Death in the Family, New York: Bantam, Part 1, Chapter 2, p. 26,^[4]

     He cleaned up the basin and flushed the lathery, hairy bits of toilet paper down the water closet.

Translations

resembling or covered in lather

• Bulgarian: насапунисан (bg) (nasapunisan)
• German: schaumig, schäumend (de)
• (deprecated template usage) {{trans-mid}}

Anagrams

• Hartley, earthly, hartely, hartley, heartly, hetaryl