biddable en · ADJ
Pronunciation
- /ˈbɪdəbəl/
- (Southern-England) audio
Etymology
Etymology tree English bid Proto-Indo-European *-dʰlom Proto-Italic *-ðlom Proto-Italic *-ðlis Latin -bilis Latin -ābilis Old French -ablebor. Middle English -able English -able English biddable From bid + -able.
Meanings
-
Docile, amenable or compliant.
She was a quite biddable creature and good-hearted, but she had a flow of talk that was as steady as a mill, and made your head sore like the drays and wagons in a city.
1889, Mark Twain, chapter 12, in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court:What Western diplomats thought they saw in Bucharest's anti-Russian autocrats were the germs of a new Tito: stable, biddable and more interested in local power than international disruption.
2005, Tony Judt, Postwar: A History of Europe since 1945, Penguin, Part Two, Chapter XIII, p. 431:The conscripts took their fate unquestioning: resignedly, after the custom of Turkish peasantry. […] There was about them a hopeless, fever-wasted lack of initiative, which made them the most biddable, most enduring, and least spirited soldiers in the world.
1922, T. E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom, Chapter:In the first years of his rule he had attempted to bring the meek Goanese to some knowledge of cultivation as the West understood it, but though they might be biddable, the soil and the sun were not.
1933, Helen Simpson, chapter 5, in The Woman on the Beast:
- Suitable for bidding.
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| most biddable | Degree=Sup | lexicographic | |
| more biddable | Degree=Cmp | lexicographic |
Deriveds
biddability · biddably · biddableness · unbiddable
Synonyms
indulgent · tractable · tractable · passive · maniable · pliant · governable · amenable · manageable · meek · pliant · controllable · complaisant · complaisant · compliant · yielding · biddable · rulable · docile
Translations (6)
bg послушен (Docile, amenable or compliant) · fi hölläluonteinen (Docile, amenable or compliant) · fi tarjouskelpoinen (bridge: Suitable for bidding) · gv so-choyrlaghey (Docile, amenable or compliant) · bg обявим (bridge: Suitable for bidding) · bg покорен (Docile, amenable or compliant)