nunnishadj.

1570 J. Foxe Actes & Monumentes (rev. ed.) I. 178/2 Three daughters of Merwaldus..entred the profession and vow of Nunnish virginitie.

1654 R. Whitlock Ζωοτομία 203 The Nunnish, or Monastick life.

a1729 E. Taylor Metrical Hist. Christianity (1962) 338 Edgar the King of England, beside His Whoredom with Alphreda turnd aside Unto his Nunnish Whore Wilfreda.

1822 J. H. Reynolds Press ii. 65 Fosbrooke the earthworm, who each ruin haunts, And prates of nunnish robes and monkish chaunts.

1891 H. Tuckley Under the Queen 242 These women have a nunnish look.

1966 V. Nabokov Speak, Memory (U.S. rev. ed.) ii. 45 She wore a nunnish brown dress and gave off a slight but unforgettable smell of coffee and decay.

1992 J. Torrington Swing Hammer Swing! x. 95 Her pancake fakeup had been trowled [sic] on so thickly it made Dusty Springfield's lavishness in the same area look positively nunnish.

1570 J. Foxe Actes & Monumentes (rev. ed.) I. 349/2 Elysabeth the nonne, who for her holy nonnyshenes was canonised of the..churche.

2000 Vancouver Sun (Nexis) 30 Sept. e9 First, you've got to pitch that ugly tag ‘severe,’ separate it from its nunnishness, call it something else like guts or unflinchingness.