Archaic or dialectal variant of 'barley' or 'barely'; relating to or resembling barley.
Variant spelling of 'barley' or 'barely,' showing historical spelling flexibility in English. In some dialects, 'barly' was used as an adjective form meaning 'resembling or containing barley.'
Medieval spelling wasn't standardized—the same word might be written 'barley,' 'barly,' 'barli,' or 'berle' in different documents, which is why historians can't always recognize archaic words!
Complete word intelligence in one call. Free tier — 50 lookups/day.