| 释义 |
debatable, a.|dɪˈbeɪtəb(ə)l|
Also 7–9 debateable.
[a. OF. debatable (Cotgr.), debattable, f. debat(t)-re + -able: med. (Anglo-)L. debatabilis.]
1. Admitting of debate or controversy; subject to dispute; questionable.
1581Mulcaster Positions iii. (1887) 11 The difference of opinion is no proufe at all, that the matter is debatable. 1685Lond. Gaz. No. 2031/2 A Committee for considering the debateable Elections. 1817J. Scott Paris Revisit. (ed. 4) 201 Observations on certain debateable points. 1883Froude Short Stud. IV. ii. i. 177 Doctrines, which degraded accepted truths into debatable opinions.
2. esp. Said of land or territory, e.g. on the border of two countries and claimed by both: applied to lands on the borders of England and Scotland, esp. a tract between the Esk and Sark, claimed (before the Union) by both countries, and the scene of frequent contests.
[1453,1531–2See batable.] 1492in Rymer Fœdera XII. 467/2 Terras debatabiles ibidem adjacentes. 1536Bellenden Cron. Scot. (1821) I. 162 Gret contentioun betwix the Scottis and Pichtis, for certane debaitabill landis, that lay betwix thair realmes. 1549Compl. Scot. viii. 74 Neutral men, lyik to the ridars that dueillis on the debatabil landis. 1604(title), A Booke of the survaie of the debatable and border lands. 1609Skene Reg. Maj. 11 Quhither the defender hes any other land in the towne, quhere the debaitable land lyes, or nocht. 1777Nicolson & Burn Hist. Westm. & Cumb. I. p. lxxii, The Debateable Land..became a further bone of contention between the two snarling parties. c1800K. White Lett. (1837) 338 The debateable ground of the Peloponnesians. 1820Scott Abbot ii, The Græmes who then inhabited the Debateable Land. 1838Thirlwall Greece III. 129 Guarding a debatable frontier.
b. fig. Of regions of thought, etc.
1814Chalmers Evid. Chr. Revel. i. 31 Christianity is now looked upon as debateable ground. 1870Farrar Fam. Speech iv. (1873) 118 The..debateable lands of the separate linguistic kingdoms.
†B. as n. The Debatable Land (on the border of England and Scotland: see 2 above); also pl. the residents on this land (sometimes debatablers).
1551Edw. VI Lit. Rem. (Roxb.) II. 389 The lord Maxwell did upon malice to the English debatables overrun them. Ibid. 390 Then shal the Scottis wast their debatablers, and we ours. Ibid 407 The commissionars for the Debatable. 1568in H. Campbell Love-Lett. Mary Q. Scots App. (1824) 15 The contraversy yerely arising by occasion of certain grounds upon the frontiers in the East Marches, commonly called the ‘Threap-land’, or ‘Debatable’. |