starched

Etymology

verb

  1. simple past and past participle of starch

adj

  1. Of a garment: having had starch applied.
  2. Stiff, formal, rigid; prim and proper.
    1712, Jonathan Swift, An Argument Against Abolishing Christianity, in The Works of Jonathan Swift, Dublin: George Faulkner, 1751, Volume 1, pp. 102-103, Does the Gospel any where prescribe a starched squeezed Countenance, a stiff formal Gait, a Singularity of Manners and Habit, or any affected Modes of Speech, different from the reasonable Part of Mankind?
    ‘[…] CD is a fair-enough scholar but starched like my grand-daddy’s collar.’ 1961, Bernard Malamud, A New Life, Penguin, published 1968, page 107

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