Adjective: potable
Comparison Forms
Synthetic
Perifrastic
| Comparative | more potable |
| Superlative | most potable |
Sample Sentences
-
potable water
-
The water from this river should not be considered potable without disinfection: you may be OK if you drink it raw, but you're gambling if you do so.
Adjectives inflected like potable
priest-ridden,
unreposed,
evadible,
dissentious,
dissentient,
unforesighted,
egocentrical,
unephemeral,
unennobling,
mensuralist,
flocculent,
unseductive,
whoopsy,
whooshy,
surrogate,
Nicodian,
unrepaired,
prismatoidal,
renorenal,
unseducible, etc. (List truncated at 20 adjectives)
Etymology
1. The adjective is derived from Late Middle English potable (“drinkable, potable”), from Middle French, Old French potable (modern French potable (“drinkable, potable”)), and from its etymon Late Latin pōtābilis (“drinkable, potable”), from Latin pōtāre (“to drink”) + -bilis (suffix forming adjectives indicating a capacity or worth of being acted upon). Pōtāre is the present active infinitive of pōtō (“to drink”), from Proto-Italic *pōtos, from Proto-Indo-European *peh₃- (“to drink”).
2. The English word is cognate with Catalan potable, Italian potabile, Spanish potable.
3. The noun is derived from the adjective. See: French Adjectives '
potable', Catalan Adjectives '
potable', Italian Adjectives '
potabile', Spanish Adjectives '
potable'.