Obs. Forms: 5 ale-bre, -brey, albery, 5–7 alebery. [f. ALE- 3 + OE. bríw pottage, brewis: changed by its unaccented position to bre, brey, varying phonetically with -bery, of which -berry is a corruption due to erroneous etymology. Cf. bread-berry.] Ale boiled with spice and sugar and sops of bread; also called alebrue, and ale-meat (see ALE- in comb. II).
c. 1420. Lib. Cure Coc. (1862), 53. Alebre þus make þou schalle With grotes and safroune and good ale.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., Albery, vel alebrey [1499 albry] Alebrodium, fictum est.
1543. Becon, Agst. Swear., Wks. 1843, 373. They would taste nothing, no, not so much as a poor aleberry … until they had slain Paul.
1630. J. Taylor (Water P.), Gt. Eater, 12. His appetite … needed the assistance of cawdle, iulep, alebery.
