valuableadj.n.

1539 Act 31 Hen. VIII xii. f. xvi Euerye inheritour & possessour of manours landes or tenementes..shuld..enioy the profites reuenues and commodities of the same, as well in thynges of hygh pleasure, as in thynges commonly valuable.

1589 T. Nashe To Students in R. Greene Menaphon Epist. sig. **2^v Which being the effect of an vndescerning iudgement, makes drosse as valuable as gold.

1621 T. Mun Disc. Trade 13 40. or 50. thousand pounds starling..is no valuable summ in respect of that wealth which is carried from Aleppo and Constantinople into Persia for Raw-silkes.

1686 Bp. G. Burnet Some Lett. conc. Switzerland iii. 131 I did not see the Gospel of St. Mark, which is one of the valuablest things of the Treasure.

1710 H. Prideaux Orig. & Right Tithes ii. 77 Which makes ‘tithes’ at least one fourth part less valueable to them, than they were to the Levitical Priesthood.

1757 tr. J. G. Keyssler Trav. III. 295 A very valuable cabinet where the arrangement is very judicious, especially as to the coins and medals.

1776 Trial Maha Rajah Nundocomar for Forgery 82/2 Do you know whether he kept jewels, or other valuable effects there?

1825 J. R. McCulloch Princ. Polit. Econ. i. i. 2 A commodity or a product is not valuable because it is useful; but it is valuable because it can only be procured by the intervention of labour.

1876 H. Fawcett Man. Polit. Econ. (ed. 5) iii. xvi. 503 Gold was, during the Middle Ages, about 16 times more valuable than the same weight of silver.

1934 Z. Fitzgerald Auction—Model 1934 in Esquire July 155/2 And the collection, after all, is just about as valuable now as the Polish and Peruvian bonds of our thriftier friends.

1974 Amer. Jrnl. Psychol. 87 481 More valuable coins were overestimated in number compared with less valuable coins.

2008 Guardian 9 Sept. 7/1 A giant sea snail which can produce rare and valuable pearls is being closely guarded at Birmingham's National Sea Life Centre.

1611 R. Fenton Treat. Vsurie i. vii. 30 If it come meerely for loane, without any other valuable consideration..then is it that vsurie whereof the question moued is now to be discussed.

1656 R. Sanderson 20 Serm. 141 Some small trifle or other: which being of very little worth or use, and so not to be taken for a valuable consideration, may therefore be called nought or nothing.

1705 W. Nicolson London Diaries 26 Dec. (1985) 336 An old painted Legend of St Guthlac..is in the possession of Mr Le Neve; who will part with it, or any thing else, on a valuable Consideration.

1766 W. Blackstone Comm. Laws Eng. II. 297 A valuable consideration is such as money, marriage, or the like, which the law esteems an equivalent given for the grant.

1818 W. Cruise Digest Laws Eng. Real Prop. (ed. 2) II. 64 Not even an alienation, for a valuable consideration, to a purchaser..will avoid it.

1898 Ld. Harris in Westm. Gaz. 15 Oct. 7/1 Who will satisfy themselves that no valuable consideration has passed between the respective county clubs to bring about the transfer.

1921 A. Tardieu Truth about Treaty xiii. 419 To obtain valuable consideration to the amount of 112,000,000 francs..France was thenceforward to pay 22,000,000 francs in premiums and 190,625,000 francs in advances.

1980 Globe & Mail (Toronto) (Nexis) 21 Mar. The counts allege that he obtained a valuable consideration and sums of money for himself, his wife and his mother-in-law.

2007 Times (Nexis) 10 May 2 The legal argument focused on whether..a property adjustment order amounted to valuable consideration.

1613 in S. Tymms Wills & Inventories Bury St. Edmunds (1850) 159 Vpon trust and confidence that they..shall demise the same at a valewable rent, and to the best profite.

1663 S. Tuke Adventures of Five Hours Ep. Ded. It is Your Pleasure (Noble Sir) that I should hold my Fortune from You; like those Tenants, who pay some Inconsiderable Trifle in lieu of a Valuable Rent.

1797 Laws of Maryland (1798) lxxxix §41 The said commissioners shall..consider the tenancy in dower, by curtesy, or for life, in possession, or estate for fifteen years without any valuable rent reserved, generally worth half the value of the fee-simple.

1818 M. Dawes Epitome Law Landed Prop. 73 The redendum..reserves a pepper-corn rent for one, two or three years, while the ground is building upon, and at the end thereof yeilding and paying a valuable rent for the rest of the term.

1876 H. N. Mozley & G. C. Whiteley Law Dict. 301/1 Even where an actual valuable return is not payable, it is usual to indicate the relation of reversioner and tenant by reserving a peppercorn or other nominal rent.

1567 T. Stapleton Counterblast iv. xiii. f. 522 For Christ is the only mediatour, as both God and man, that is, as a meritorius and effectuall mediation, valuable through it self.

1638 T. Herbert Some Yeares Trav. (rev. ed.) 146 Somewhat further, over heaps of stones of valewable portraictures, we mount towards the most lofty part of this Pallace.

1690 R. Boyle Let. 18 Oct. in Corr. (2001) VI. 313 You have not Censur'd me..for my not having sent you all this While an Acknoledgement of your Obligeing Letter and the Veluable present that Accompanyed it.

1727 R. Bradley Compl. Body Husbandry 236 The carrot is another deep rooted plant, and is valuable for the sake of the root as well as for the seed.

a1768 T. Secker Serm. Several Subj. (1770) IV. xviii. 387 Yet we never..doubt of their having a real, though unknown, Subserviency to valuable Ends.

1801 Med. & Physical Jrnl. 5 173 If they should accord with the spirit of your very valuable Journal, you are at full liberty to insert them.

1855 T. B. Macaulay Hist. Eng. IV. xviii. 248 At such a moment the ministers could not refuse to listen to any person who professed himself able to give them valuable information.

1875 B. Jowett in tr. Plato Dialogues (ed. 2) V. 81 No instrument of education is more valuable than arithmetic.

1900 Daily News 7 Sept. 6/5 The two petrol omnibuses now running had taught them some valuable lessons.

1972 E. Wigginton Foxfire Bk. 254 The more we researched this chapter [on hunting], the more valuable an asset we found a good dog to be.

2009 N.Y. Times (National ed.) 13 Sept. (Styles section) 8/1 Your husband's work is recognized as inherently valuable, and your relatives are given preferential treatment.

1581 J. Bell tr. W. Haddon & J. Foxe Against Jerome Osorius f. 390^v Releases & Pardons were esteemed, not to be in any respect valuable to clense the sinnes of guiltye consciences in the sight of God simply: but should be as pledges and witnesses of a full releasing their penaunce.

1645 H. Hammond Pract. Catech. 217 Peace and quiet living, if it may be gotten, is more valuable to them then life it selfe deprived of that.

1694 P. Falle Acct. Isle of Jersey ii. 67 'Tis a Sea-weed..more valuable to Us than the choicest Plant that grows in our Gardens.

1702 Clarendon's Hist. Rebellion I. i. 67 King James..would often say, ‘that his access to the Crown of England was the more valuable to him, as it redeem'd him from the subjection to the ill manners..of those Preachers’.

1748 B. Robins & R. Walter Voy. round World by Anson ii. iv. 164 These were the principal goods on board her; but we found besides, what was to us much more valuable than the rest of the cargoe.

1851 T. Carlyle Life J. Sterling ii. xi. 296 I..saw most of the usual wonders,—the Pæstan Temples being to me much the most valuable.

1878 W. S. Jevons Polit. Econ. 96 We may say that quinine is valuable for curing fevers,..or that water is valuable for putting out fires.

1883 Law Times 20 Oct. 405/2 Young solicitors will find many hints valuable to them interspersed among its contents.

1937 S. F. Armstrong Brit. Grasses (ed. 3) x. 215 Although definitely a ‘top grass’ of the hay type it is equally valuable for either grazing or mowing.

1956 R. Carrington Guide Earth Hist. (1958) v. 54 Two specialized types that are particularly valuable to our palaeontologist time-detectives..are fossilized dung..and fossil trackways.

2004 N.Y. Times (National ed.) 15 Jan. c2/1 A fax machine is valuable to you only if lots of other people you correspond with also have fax machines.

1598 F. Meres tr. Luis de Granada Sinners Guyde ii. xx. 513 In the harmony of the spirituall musick of the Church, he is no lesse valuable that eateth, then he that eateth not.

1645 J. Corbet Hist. Relation Mil. Govt. Gloucester 48 Every valuable person was active in his own place.

1703 E. M. Thompson Corr. Family of Hatton (1878) II. 250 Mr. Pepys, who was a very valuable person,..is dead, and was yesterday buryed.

1730 J. Southall Treat. Buggs 3 The late Learned and truly Valuable Dr. Woodward..approv'd the Design.

1776 J. Adams in J. Adams & A. Adams Familiar Lett. (1876) 148 We have this week lost a very valuable friend..by the smallpox in the natural way.

1808 S. T. Coleridge Coll. Lett. (1959) III. 76 If..perfect Simplicity and an unpretending nature, joined to shrewdness & entertainingness make a valuable Woman, Sara H. is so.

1816 J. Austen Emma I. viii. 120 In good hands, she will turn out a valuable woman. View more context for this quotation

1888 Dict. National Biogr. XL. 192/1 On her sailing for England in March 1785, he mourned her departure as that of his only valuable friend in the islands.

1943 K. A. Porter Let. 20 July (1990) iv. 271 Every talented, gifted, valuable man I know is in the army.

1981 A. Sillitoe Second Chance 204 An experienced sniper was too valuable to waste.

2006 Ecologist Feb. 15/1 It was his field work in Africa..that convinced the Syngenta-funded panel of researchers..that Hayes would be a valuable member of the team.