Sufferable

Part of speech: adjective

Pronunciation: /ˈsʌfəɹəb(ə)l/

Definitions

1. Capable of being endured or borne despite being uncomfortable
2. Capable of being handled or accepted even if not enjoyable
3. Describes something that can be put up with without excessive difficulty

Etymology: Sufferable is a plain English build: the verb "suffer" with the suffix "-able," meaning able or worthy to be. The suffix is what does most of the work here, and it carries a Latin pedigree that reaches back through the Medieval Latin "sufferābilis" to the classical verb "sufferre," "to bear or carry under." That Latin verb is itself a compound of "sub," meaning "below" or "under," and "ferre," "to bear or carry," which is why the idea of enduring, undergoing a burden, runs through both the old and the modern sense. The shift from carrying something to suffering it is the central thread: a thing that could be borne was tolerable, and that is still the sense the word carries today. Middle English had a related range of senses, including "allowable" or "permissible" and "long-suffering" or "slow to anger," so the modern sense of something merely endurable is the narrowest of the older meanings to survive. Its earlier use reached into Anglo-Norman and Old French, where "souffrable" already meant "tolerable."

Synonyms: tolerable, bearable, endurable, manageable, acceptable

Antonyms: intolerable, unbearable, insufferable, unendurable, unmanageable