silvery

From Middle English silvery, sylvyry; equivalent to silver +‎ -y.

• IPA^(key): /ˈsɪlvəɹi/, /ˈsɪlvɹi/

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silvery (comparative silverier, superlative silveriest)

1. Resembling silver in color, shiny white.
   • 1728, [Alexander Pope], “(please specify the page)”, in The Dunciad. An Heroic Poem. […], Dublin, London: […] A. Dodd, →OCLC:

     OF all th' enamell'd race, whose silvery wing / Waves to the tepid zephyrs of the spring.

   • 1898, H.G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, London: William Heinemann, page 98:

     Nothing was to be seen save flat meadows, cows feeding unconcernedly for the most part, and silvery pollard willows motionless in the warm sunlight.

   • 2014 April 21, “Subtle effects”, in The Economist, volume 411, number 8884:

     Manganism has been known about since the 19th century, when miners exposed to ores containing manganese, a silvery metal, began to totter, slur their speech and behave like someone inebriated.

2. Sprinkled or covered with silver.
3. Having the clear, musical tone of silver; soft and clear in sound.

   a silvery laugh

   • 1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:

     The hand grasped the curtain, and drew it aside, and as it did so I heard a voice, I think the softest and yet most silvery voice I ever heard.

• silvern (archaic)

• slivery