Definify.com

Webster 1913 Edition

Adj.

Abounding with shells; consisting of shells, or of a shell.

“The shelly shore.”

Prior.

Shrinks backward in his

shelly

cave.

Shakespeare

Adj.

1. Abounding with shells; as the shelly shore.

2. Consisting of shells. Lobsters disengage themselves from their shelly prisons.

See also: shelly

Shelly

A surname, variant of Shelley.
A male given name transferred from the surname, mostly of persons born before 1930.
A female given name used since 1930s, variant of Shelley.

See also: Shelly

shelly ‎(comparative shellier, superlative shelliest)

Composed of the shells of dead marine creatures
- 2000 June 16, Karl W. Flessa, “Learning from the Dead”, in Science, volume 288, number 5473, DOI:10.1126/science.288.5473.1971a, pages 1971-1972:
  After all, we live today in an unusual world: sea level is low, the continents are dispersed, ice occupies the poles, and the shelly fauna of the oceans is composed largely of aragonite rather than calcite.
Resembling, or comprising, the shell of a mollusc
- 1818, Charles Lamb, “On the Sight of Swans in Kensington Garden”, in The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb:
  Shrined are your offspring in a chrystal cradle, / Brighter than Helen's ere she yet had burst / Her shelly prison.
- 1906, Harry Caulton Reeks, Diseases of the Horse's Foot:
  It is seen commonly in connection with flat-foot, and where the horn of the wall is thin and shelly.
Abounding with shells.
- Prior
  the shelly shore
- William Shakespeare
  Shrinks backward in his shelly cave.