Etymology From pill + -y. In some cases, pill is a clipping of a longer word.
1
Covered in pills (particles created by mechanical wear).
After many washings, my favorite sweater is faded and pilly.
I gave the superintendent a deposit and I got a room on the third floor with a bed that had sheets and a pilly blanket and a pillow so flat you had to fold it over to rest your head on it.2009, Allegra Goodman, Paradise Park, page 21:
3 more examples
One was a young woman with stringy brown hair, a pilly black sweater and fabulous boots of parti-coloured suede.2015, Padma Viswanathan, The Ever After of Ashwin Rao:
So many stuffed animals. Most were pristine—their fur shiny and smooth, barely a nap on them—except for two worn creatures: a round turtle with a pilly knit shell and a brown bear with a round head and a flat body that looked like someone had literally squeezed the stuffing out of it..2017, R. J. Noonan, Where the Lost Girls Go:
Resuming her walk, she takes out her phone. Pulls up pictures of his sketches: a battered shoebox beneath a car, a cat beside the shoebox, one eye open. A pilly sweater, one arm still crossed over a pile of cash.2020, Brian Selfon, The Nightworkers:
2
Characterized by or involving many pills.
Paiuline Eichstadt spent a week at home womewhat indisposed with Eddie as doctor and nursemaid. A pilly and puny vacation he spent.1954, The Louisville & Nashville Employes' Magazine - Volume 30, page 62:
Withdrawing the smaller blade from his belt, Speezer rolled a pilly pod from the tray and sliced it open With his sharp knife.2001, Mark Harris, The Amazing Adventure in Tovia, page 59:
When buying pillies look for IQF fish.2007, Paul Worsteling, Jack Crowley, Fishing Western Port, page 18:
I prefer to have a range of thee different sizes and colours in squid jigs, but you could also try using squid fish spikes and put a pilly on it.2011, Gary Brown, How to Catch Australia's Favourite Saltwater Fish, page 62:
I attended quite a few other social-group events, made new friends, registered with other motorcycle groups as a pillion, and got out on a few rides. I was really enjoying the riding but sometimes felt frustrated if nobody was available to take a 'pilly' out.2021, Tracy-lee Adams, The Dunce:
Kattie! There's another coming. Another mattress and a pilly. Where can we put him?1873 November 29, “A London Pilgrimage among the Boarding-Houses. V. A Merchant Captain's Roost.”, in Charles Dickens, Jr., editor, All the Year Round, A Weekly Journal (New Series), volume XIpage=110, column 2, London: […] Chapman & Hall, […], published 1874:
She will have to dig a mattress and a pilly from the stair-well.1876, Lewis Strange Wingfield, Slippery ground - Volume 2, page 147:
1 more example
Her head it rests upon a pilly And she is not so very silly1914, Lachlan Macbean, Pet Marjorie, page 31: