navigable

Etymology

It is probably partly borrowed from Middle French navigable, recorded in French from the mid 15th century,^[2][3][4][5] and partly borrowed from Latin nāvigābilis (“suitable for shipping, navigable”).^[2][6][7][4] Etymonline dates the French word to the 14th century.^[6] The French adjective is formed from naviguer with -able, after the Latin one,^[2] which is from nāvigō (“to sail, sail over, steer a ship”) and the suffix -bilis.^[2][8][7] The Latin verb is formed from nāvis (“ship”) and the stem of agō (“to drive, set in motion”),^[7][6][9] which Etymonline traces to Proto-Indo-European *nau- (“boat”) and Proto-Indo-European *ag- (“to drive”).^[6] The OED compares Spanish navegable (about 1580).^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of a river, allowing the passage of ships: the Middle English Dictionary quotes Hardyng's Chronicle, composed in 1464 and printed by Grafton in 1543, on the river Tay, navigable from the East Sea to Saint John's town for ships carrying forty tuns of wine.^[10] Etymonline likewise dates the word to the mid 15th century,^[6] the Shorter Oxford to late Middle English^[4] and Merriam-Webster to the 15th century,^[3] while the revised OED's first record is from before 1527, of open sea, in R. Thorne.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The adjective was first used of waters that ships can pass: the sea, a strait or a lake (before 1527), and a river or canal (1530, in Palsgrave).^[2] Johnson (1755) defined it simply as passable by ships or boats.^[11] In the 16th and 17th centuries it was also used of a place reachable by water (1569–1649), of a voyage that involved sailing (1570–1665) and of a seaworthy vessel (1535–1809), and in the sense "naval, maritime" (1597–1857).^[2] With the first balloons it came to mean "able to be steered" (1783),^[2] a sense Merriam-Webster and Collins still give.^[3][12] From 1882 the adjective was also used as a noun for such a balloon or airship.^[2] Since 1893 it has also been used of land routes and terrain, and later of airspace.^[2]

Timeline

• 1464 – of a river, allowing ships to pass, in Hardyng's Chronicle.^[10]
• before 1527 – of a sea or strait.^[2]
• 1530 – of a river or canal.^[2]
• 1535 – of a vessel, seaworthy (obsolete by 1809).^[2]
• 1783 – of a balloon, able to be steered.^[2]
• 1882 – noun, a navigable balloon or airship.^[2]
• 1893 – of terrain or a route, able to be crossed.^[2]

Meanings

Adjective

1. Of a river, sea or other water, deep, wide or safe enough for ships or boats to pass: The canal is navigable as far as the old mill.^[3][12][2]
2. Able to be steered or controlled: a navigable airship.^[3][12][2]
3. Of land or a route, able to be crossed or travelled over.^[2]

Word family

• navigability
• navigably
• nonnavigable

Related words

• navigate
• navigation
• navigator
• naval
• navy

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c d e Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
7. ^ a b c Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
8. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
9. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
11. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
12. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins