Mean, contemptible. A contraction for “ordinary,” which in this sense is nearly obsolete in England.
1785. An Irish parson, remarkable ordinary in his person.—Mass. Spy, Oct. 6.
1800. This ordinary drunken wretch is supposed to be the perpetrator.—The Aurora, Phila., May 1.
1830. You ornery fellow! do you pretend to call me to account for my language?—Mass. Spy, July 28, from the N.Y. Constellation. (Given as a Southernism).
1836. One instance [of peculiarities of Philadelphia pronunciation] is in ornary. We have been taught to pronounce this ordinary; but our teachers were bombastic fellows.—Phila. Public Ledger, Aug. 22.
1837. You ’re all a pack of poor or’nary common people.—Knick. Mag., ix. 68 (Jan.).
1848. He said, the mate had hired him for “or’nary theaman” [seaman].—Yale Lit. Mag., xiv. 83 (Dec.).
1856. A Polka, did you say, Simblon—No—that ’s tres low-flung, excessivement or’nery.—Knick. Mag., xlvii. 409 (April).
1854. [He was] sent to Freehold court-house last term, for ’busin’ his wife! Awful or’nary.—Id., xliii. 319 (March).
1856. Ruther an ornary looking woman, but quite ginteel and intellectible.—Whitcher, ‘The Widow Bedott Papers,’ No. 19.
1856. There was the minister’s wife in her seat, lookin jest as if nothin’ had happened more’n or’nary.—Id., No. 27.
1857. Sally was entering on her nineteenth year, when she was heard one day to observe that men were the meanest, slowest, cowardliest, or’nariest creatures—in short, good for nothing but to lie under an apple-tree with their mouths open, and wait until the apples dropped into them.—D. H. Strother, ‘Virginia Illustrated,’ p. 202 (N.Y.).
1857. That poor ornary cuss of a red-headed, cross-eyed grocery-keeper, that you are trying to force her to marry!—Knick. Mag., l. 442 (Nov.).
1859. Thare’s Iargo who is more ornery nor pizun…. Obsarve how Iargo got Casheo drunk as a biled owl on corn whiskey in order to karry out his sneekin desines.—Artemus Ward, ‘Wax Figures vs. Shakspeare.’
1862.
| Nor sot apart from ornery folks in featurs nor in figgers, | |
| Ef ourn ’ll keep their faces washed, you ’ll know ’em from their niggers. | |
Lowell, ‘Biglow Papers,’ Second S., No. 3. |
1862.
| Not in ornery times, though we ’re willin’ to feed ’em | |
| With a nod now an’ then, when we happen to need ’em. | |
Id., No. 4. |
1888. He’s a good enough fellow, only he’s an onery [sic] scamp of a Republican.—Mrs. Custer, ‘Tenting on the Plains,’ p. 286.
*** In examples 1848, 1856, 1862, the word is used for “ordinary” in its common acceptation.
