burly Meaning, Definition & Usage

  1. adjective satellite muscular and heavily built
    buirdly; husky; beefy; strapping.
    • a beefy wrestler
    • had a tall burly frame
    • clothing sizes for husky boys
    • a strapping boy of eighteen
    • `buirdly' is a Scottish term

WordNet

Bur"ly adjective
Etymology
OE. burlich strong, excellent; perh. orig. fit for a lady's bower, hence handsome, manly, stout. Cf. Bower.
Definitions
  1. Having a large, strong, or gross body; stout; lusty; -- now used chiefly of human beings, but formerly of animals, in the sense of stately or beautiful, and of inanimate things that were huge and bulky. "Burly sacks." Drayton.
    In his latter days, with overliberal diet, [he was] somewhat corpulent and burly. Sir T. More.
    Burly and big, and studious of his ease. Cowper.
  2. Coarse and rough; boisterous.
    It was the orator's own burly way of nonsense. Cowley.

Webster 1913