Meanings
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1
adj
having many sharp points or projections; in this passage, standing up in stiff pointed tufts
His spiky hair stood up in sharp tufts after he removed his hat.
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2
adj
Of a plant: producing spikes (“ears (as of corn); inflorescences in which sessile flowers are arranged on unbranched elongated axes”).
[T]he harvest maids began to look knowingly to their partners, who, taking the hint, sprang to their feet, hauled up their sweet abettors, were mated in a moment, and commenced a dance among the stubble, so brisk, that the tall harvest of spiky wheat, standing by, rustled and nodded to them on its golden rods.
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3
adj
Of a plant part: resembling a spike of a plant (see above).
Of this kinde, there is founde an other, the Spikes, eares, or torches wherof, are very dubble, ſo as in euery Spyky eare, in ſteede of the little knappes or heades, it bringeth forth a number of other ſmal torches, wherof eche one is lyke to the ſpike or torch of great Plantayne. […] The ſtalkes [of the third kind of plaintain] be creſted or ſtraked, and beare at the toppe fayre ſpiked knappes with white floures or bloſſoms, like the ſpykie knoppes of the middle Plantayne.
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4
adj
Having one or more spikes; spiny.
The ſpiky VVheels thro' Heaps of Carnage tore; / And thick the groaning Axles dropp'd vvith Gore.
Thesaurus
Etymology
From spike (“piece of pointed metal, etc.”) + -y (suffix forming adjectives with the sense “having the quality of”). Spike is derived from Middle English spik, spike (“large metal (usually iron) nail; thing shaped like such a nail”); further etymology uncertain, possibly from Middle Dutch spiker (“large nail”), Middle Low German spiker (“large nail”), or Old Norse spík (“spike; sprig”), all possibly from Latin spīca (“ear, head, or spike of grain; plant spike”) (see further at etymology 1), or from Proto-Germanic *spīkō (“large nail, spike”), both ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *spey-...