Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US) commonplace, of poor quality.

1816		U. Brown Journal in Maryland Hist. Mag. (1915) X 369: A thin pidece of country where the Land is old, completely worn out, the farming extremely ornary in general .
1844		J.C. Neal Peter Ploddy and Other Oddities 178: Common people, Billy – low, ornery, common people.
1862		‘Artemus Ward’ Artemus Ward, His Book 46: He don’t do nobody no good & is a cuss to society [...] I must say the reglar perfessional Sperrit rappers [...] air — abowt the most ornery set of cusses I ever enkountered in my life.
1871		B. Harte ‘Jim’ in Poems 52: Why, you limb. You ornery, / Derned old Long-legged Jim!
1887		E. Custer Tenting on the Plains (rev. edn 1895) 181: He’s a good enough fellow, only he’s an onery scamp of a Republican.
1894		G.A. Sala Things I Have Seen I 255: A most miscellaneous assemblage of what the Americans call ‘ornary’ people.
c.1895		‘O. Henry’ ‘Aristocracy Versus Hash’ in Rolling Stones (1913) 201: I want a scrubby, ornery, low-down, snuff-dipping, back-woodsy, piebald gang.
1902		Laurens Advertiser (SC) 15 Jan. 4/1: They ain’t man, woman ner child — doggone it, even er ornerey yaller purp ner scasely er flea on that pup.
1903		D.S. Crumb ‘Dialect of Southeastern Missouri’ in DN II:v 323: ornary (often ornery), adj. Inferior.
1909		W.M. Raine Brand Blotters (1912) 142: Dad burn yore ornery hide, I ain’t seen you long enough for a good talk in a coon’s age.
1916		‘A-No. 1’ Snare of the Road 47: A handout for an ornery cuss like you!
1924		Comfort Mag. Jan. 16: Hit’s jest a lot of ornery, lazy folks, mostly moonshiners an’ hoss-traders.
1927		(con. WW1) P. MacDonald Patrol 71: ‘I’m just an ornery little — !’.
1934		O. Strange Sudden 54: In sifts an ornery little runt like yu.
1948		(con. 1944) N. Mailer Naked and Dead 17: Why, you ornery sonofabitch, give me that gun.
1950		A.B. Guthrie Way West 79: It ain’t an easy place [...] some sorry they set out and some just naturally ornery.
1953		Randolph & Wilson Down in the Holler 269: ornery, onery: adj. Inferior, mean, worthless.
1977		R. Coover Public Burning (1979) 412: Look what that onry galoot done to that!
1989		(con. 1960s) M. Kingston Tripmaster Monkey 293: You strike me as ornery. I drink to you, an ornery American man.

2. (US) coarse, unpleasant.

1830		Mass. Spy 28 July n.p.: You ornery fellow ! do you pretend to call me to account for my language?
1837		Knickerbocker (N.Y.) ix Jan. 68: You’re all a pack of poor or’ nary common people.
1857		D.H. Strother Virginia Illus. 202: She was heard one day to observe that men were the meanest, slowest, cowardliest, or’nariest creatures.
1875		M. Thompson Hoosier Mosaics 16: When the sheriff grabbed the gal he called her George, and said she wasn’t no gal at all, but jist a terrible onery boy ’at had been stealin’ an’ counterfeitin’ an’ robbin’ all round everywhere.
1897		A.H. Lewis Wolfville 11: If I was low an’ ornery like this Lizard.
1904		Eve. teleg. (Dundee) 4 June 3/1: Ornery Cusses. At Marlborough Street Police Court:— Prosecutor— His language was too bad to repeat.
1907		S.E. White Arizona Nights 74: The killer is a low-done ornery scub, and he don’t hesitate at no treachery or ingratitude to keep is carcass safe.
1917		‘A-No. 1’ From Coast to Coast with Jack London 101: I’ve got a regular ‘lead pipe cinch’ on the grabbing of the onery scamps.
1921		P. & T. Casey Gay-cat 274: Who act so tarnation queer and ornery?
1931		Sterling Brown ‘New St. Louis Blues II’ in Botkin Folk-Say 120: Life do her dirty in a hundred ornery ways.
1940		F. Hunt Long Trail from Texas 120: Never seen such an ornery lookin’ bunch of critters in my life.
1943		W. Guthrie Bound for Glory (1969) 20: Drunk! Sick! Hungry! Dirty! Mean! Onery! I won’t lie like you rats!
1953		S. Bellow Augie March (1996) 119: Here things were too harsh and ornery to be influenced; the clamor and fights and the obscene yelling [...] weren’t going to stop.
1964		J. Berryman 77 Dream Songs 13: Mr Bones, / as I look on the saffron sky, / you strikes me as ornery.
1976		Cab Calloway Of Minnie the Moocher and Me 124: Ordinary, ornery working people.
2013		B.H. Shepherd ‘Rogues Gallery’ in ThugLit July-Aug. [ebook] An old and ornery white trash redneck.

3. ill-tempered, cantankerous, mean-spirited.

1870		Overland Monthly (CA) Jan. in Schele De Vere (1872) 621: That ar Black Bess is the ornarest aninmule I ever see.
1894		Mirror of Life 13 Jan. 16/1: ‘Dan was onery [sic] Him give Reub up’.
1896		Ade Artie (1963) 53: I felt so ornery about the night that me and Munster laid open the town that I’d ’a’ done most anything to get even with myself.
1902		Ade Forty Modern Fables 277: This Ornery Cynic would pull out his little Book and cite the Case.
1916		J. Lait ‘Annye’s Ma’ in Beef, Iron and Wine (1917) 280: Dale Hill, just old enough to be ornery and not old enough to make it a three-act.
1928		C. McKay Home to Harlem 160: The chef was a great black bundle of consciously suppressed desires. That was doubtless why he was so ornery.
1944		C. Himes ‘Christmas Gift’ in Coll. Stories (1990) 351: No doubt Tim Prentiss, one of the sheriff’s deputies, the ornery son of a bitch.
1947		S.J. Perelman Westward Ha! 71: I don’t rile easy, but when I’m mean, I’m ornery as pizen.
1953		L. Uris Battle Cry (1964) 104: The first time we realized how ornery he is came shortly after he joined the outfit.
1964		J. Thompson Pop. 1280 in Four Novels (1983) 486: You [...] low-down, worthless, no-good, mean, hateful, two-timing, ornery —.
1973		S. Ace Stand On It (1979) 94: A car is just like a horse. It’s a mean-headed, ornery sumbitch.
1984		I. Doig Eng. Creek 285: It is an ornery sonofabitch.
1991		B. Hamper Rivethead (1992) 57: By night’s end you’d be totally gassed and ornery enough to punch out your own grandmother.
2000		G. Pelecanos Shame the Devil 58: You were real ornery tonight, Dimitri.
2019		C.D. Rosales Word Is Bone [ebook] Walter, the landlord, was what one might call ornery.

4. (US campus) sexually suggestive.

1970

Current Sl. V:2 11: Ornery, adj. Sexually suggestive.