1. Covered with stubble, stubbled.
1600. Surflet, Country Farm, V. xviii. 692. Fasels grow in stubbly grounds.
1611. Cotgr., Chaumin … Stubblie; made of, or, couered with, stubble.
1789. D. Davidson, Thoughts Seasons, 130. An, o’er the stibbly plain, the nibbling rooks, In numbers spread.
1854. Surtees, Handley Cr., xxxix. (1901), II. 29. ‘Chi-e-l-dren,’ continued our master, dry-shaving his stubbly chin, ‘are certain cares’ [etc.].
1879. Stevenson, Trav. Cevennes, 146. It led into a valley between fading hills, stubbly with rocks like a reaped field of corn.
2. Resembling stubble; esp. of hair, bristly.
1849. Alb. Smith, Pottleton Legacy, xxx. 332. Two little stubbly tufts rising from his crown.
1864. Realm, 25 May, 3. The stubbly staple of Lord Russell’s arguments is the material we have managed to convince Europe that the British Lion is stuffed with.
1885. Rider Haggard, K. Solomon’s Mines, xix. My stubbly hair came out of the treasure cave about three shades greyer than it went in.
Comb. 1891. Daily News, 1 Sept., 3/1. Stubbly-chinned.
