Choate

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Being in a state of total completeness with all necessary components present Characterized by an organized and defined framework that indicates readiness Relating to conditions where all aspects are clearly established and accounted for
2. Having everything fully formed and lacking nothing essential in any part
3. Entirely finished with all elements correctly and sufficiently included

Etymology: "Choate" is a back-formation from "inchoate," which means that someone reasoning backward from "inchoate" produced it, not that it grew naturally from an older root. "Inchoate" describes something just begun and not yet fully formed, and its opposite sense, complete and lacking nothing, was born by removing the familiar "in-" prefix and reading the remaining word as its contrary. That reversal is the surprising part: a word meaning "just beginning" gave rise to a word meaning "finished." Language users sometimes split off a supposed prefix this way, so the new form looks like a simple opposite even though its history runs through the older word.

Synonyms: complete, finished, entire, whole, developed

Antonyms: incomplete, unfinished, partial, fragmented, disordered