n., pl., -lies.
- Chiefly Southern U.S. A mudhole; a mire.
- The loblolly pine.
[Perhaps dialectal lob, to bubble + lolly, broth.]
REGIONAL NOTE Loblolly is a combination of lob, probably an onomatopoeia for the thick heavy bubbling of cooking porridge, and lolly, an old British dialect word for "broth, soup, or any other food boiled in a pot." Thus, loblolly originally denoted thick porridge or gruel, especially that eaten by sailors onboard ship. In the southern United States, the word is used to mean "a mudhole; a mire," a sense derived from an allusion to the consistency of porridge. The name loblolly has become associated with several varieties of trees as well, all of which favor wet bottomlands or swamps in the Gulf and South Atlantic states.
