a. [f. TREACLE sb. + -Y.] Resembling treacle in quality or appearance; having the sweetness or sticky consistence of treacle; also fig. characterized by excessive sweetness: cloyingly sweet; sugared, honeyed.
1733. Shaw, Chem. Lect., xi. (1755), 218. A proper, or rich, syrupy, or treacly Substance.
1800. W. Taylor, in Monthly Mag., X. 317. It bestows … even on novelty of thought, a flat featureless mien, an insipid treacly sameness,… very unfavourable to impression.
1837. T. Hood, in Mem. (1860), I. 159. Whose book … although so treacley … does not please the natives.
1866. R. M. Ferguson, Electr. (1870), 243. India-rubber … some specimens of it having become treacly.
Hence Treacliness, treacly quality or condition.
1876. Leicester Chron., 18 Nov., 5/3. The shiny, horny quality which the opponents of transparent painting call ‘treacliness.’
1884. Nature, 22 May, 89/1. The property of viscosity or treaclyness possessed more or less by all fluids is the general influence conducive to steadiness.
