breakable

Able to break or be broken.

Adjective

  1. Able to break or be broken.
    • The accident was also one of several since Clapham […] that demonstrated the role of breakable windows in the death toll. RSSB research would later confirm and reinforce the need for laminated glass to protect...
  2. Fragile.
    • Next Christmas she sent us bisque dolls, very lovely but too breakable to hug; we could not even kiss them but they cracked. - 1942, Emily Carr, “Ways of Getting Round”, in The Book of Small, Toronto, Ont.: Oxford...

Origin

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *bʰreg-der. Proto-Germanic *brekaną Proto-West Germanic *brekan Old English brecan Middle English breken English break Proto-Indo-European *-tḗr Proto-Indo-European *-dʰlom Proto-Indo-European *-dʰlis Proto-Italic *-ðlis Latin -bilis Latin -ābilis Old French -ablebor. Middle English -able English -able English breakable From break + -able.

Forms

more breakable most breakable

Synonyms

frangible fragile

Antonyms

unbreakable

Derived

breakableness breakably nonbreakable

Noun

  1. Something that is (easily) breakable.
    • We had to wrap all the breakables before the movers arrived.
    • She was, she wrote, “impatient and absent-minded, prone to drop things intentionally or through clumsiness, even breakables like dishes and love affairs; a woman who is perennially on the move, changing jobs and homes...
  2. A set of customized hardware that is part of a drum kit. Breakables typically consist of: the drummer's cymbals including high-hats, the snare drum, the kick pedal and the drummer's stool.

Forms

breakables