palpable
UK/ˈpælpəbəl//ˈpælpəbəl/
palpable adjective: capable of being touched, felt or handled; touchable, tangible.
Adjective
palpable (comparative more palpable, superlative most palpable)
- Capable of being touched, felt or handled; touchable, tangible.
- Osric: A hit, a very palpable hit.c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac...
- The imagination shuns to reveal its workings, unless it can clothe them in some lovely and palpable shape, and create into existence the high romance, the mournful song, the animated canvass, or the carved marble;...1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XX, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume I, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 227
- Obvious or easily perceived; noticeable.
- Although the Celebrity was almost impervious to sarcasm, he was now beginning to exhibit visible signs of uneasiness,[…]. It was with a palpable relief that he heard the first warning notes of the figure.1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC
- Her voice, her palpable agitation, prepared us for something extraordinary.1913, Sax Rohmer, chapter 24, in The Insidious Dr. Fu Manchu
- Synonyms:
- manifest, noticeable, patent
- That can be detected by palpation.
palpable meaning in Tamil, Marathi, Urdu and Malayalam
palpable in Tamil
- உணரக்கூடிய, தொடக்கூடிய, தொட்டு உணரக்கூடிய, தட்டுப்படும், தொட்டறியும், தொட்டுணரும்
palpable in Marathi
- capable of being touched
- स्पर्शज्ञेय sparśajñey, स्पर्शनीय sparśanīy
- obvious
- धडधडीत dhaḍadhḍīt
palpable in Urdu
- صریح, ظاہر
palpable in Malayalam
- noticeable, tangible, touchable
- തൊട്ടറിയാവുന്ന, സ്പർശവേദ്യമായ, പ്രത്യക്ഷമായ, കാണത്തക്ക, വീക്ഷിക്കത്തക്ക, ആലഭനീയ
- perceivable, perceptible, visible
- ഗോചര, ഉപലഭ്യ, ഐന്ദ്രിക, ഐന്ദ്രിയ, ഇന്ദ്രിയഗോചരമായ, ഗ്രഹിക്കത്തക്ക
More languagesFewer languages
- palpable in Kannada
- ಸುಲಭವಾಗಿ ಗ್ರಹಿಸಬಲ್ಲ, ಇಂದ್ರಿಯ ಗ್ರಾಹ್ಯ, ಸ್ಪಷ್ಟ, ಪ್ರತ್ಯಕ್ಷ
Examples of palpable in a sentence
- I had felt that some palpable although invisible object had passed lightly by my person.1838, Edgar Allan Poe, Ligeia:
- The next morning the fog had given way to a palpable, horizontally driving rain.1894, Bret Harte, “The Heir of the McHulishes”, in A Protegee of Jack Hamlin's and Other Stories:
- [T]he gondolas stole in and out of the opaque distance more noiselessly and dreamily than ever; and a silence, almost palpable, lay upon the mutest city in the world.1906, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], quoting William Dean Howells, “William Dean Howells”, in What Is Man? And Other...
- The force of her horror must have been palpable in the air, because Jorge's eyes opened as she raised the bayonet up.2023 October 12, HarryBlank, “Fire in the Hole”, in SCP Foundation, archived from the original on 22 May 2024:
Synonyms of palpable
Antonyms
Forms of palpable
| comparative | more palpable |
|---|---|
| superlative | most palpable |
Origin of palpable
From Middle French palpable and its source, Latin palpābilis, which is from palpō (“to touch softly”) + -bilis.
Words formed from palpable
Questions about palpable
- What does palpable mean?
- Palpable means capable of being touched, felt or handled; touchable, tangible.
- What is palpable in Tamil?
- Palpable in Tamil is உணரக்கூடிய, தொடக்கூடிய, தொட்டு உணரக்கூடிய. See Palpable meaning in Tamil.
- How do you use palpable in a sentence?
- I had felt that some palpable although invisible object had passed lightly by my person.
- What part of speech is palpable?
- Palpable is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce palpable?
- Palpable is pronounced /ˈpælpəbəl/ (UK).
Words near palpable in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: palpable (page history and authors); palpable (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); palpable (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); palpable (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); palpable (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-palpable.ogg, en-au-palpable.ogg.
Cite this entry: “palpable.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/palpable. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.