honourable

See also: Honourable

English

Etymology

From Middle English honourable, from Old French honorable, honurable, from Latin honōrābilis, from honōrō (“to honour”); cognate with Italian onorabile, Spanish honorable. By surface analysis, honour +‎ -able. In this sense, largely displaced Old English ārfæst.

Adjective

honourable (comparative more honourable, superlative most honourable)

1. (British spelling) Standard spelling of honorable.
   • 1846, George Luxford, Edward Newman, The Phytologist: a popular botanical miscellany: Volume 2, Part 2, page 474:

     It was aptly said by Newton that "whatever is not deduced from facts must be regarded as hypothesis," but hypothesis appears to us a title too honourable for the crude guessings to which we allude.

   • 1959 October, O. S. Nock, “British Locomotive Practice and Performance”, in Railway Magazine, pages 705, 724:

     The days of steam on the railways of Kent are now indeed numbered, and when stage two of the electrification is completed through Tonbridge to Ashford, Folkestone and Dover a long and honourable chapter in transport will be virtually closed.

Derived terms

• do the honourable thing
• honourability
• honourableness
• honourably
• unhonourable

Noun

honourable (plural honourables)

1. (British spelling) Standard spelling of honorable.
   • 1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC:

     So she invites her father and sister to a second day's dinner (if those sides, or ontrys, as she calls 'em, weren't served yesterday, I'm d—d), and to meet City folks and littery men, and keeps the Earls and the Ladies, and the Honourables to herself.