defatigable
English
WOTD – 15 August 2006
Etymology
Latin defatigatus, past participle of defatigare (“to tire or weary”).
Pronunciation
- (UK) IPA(key): [dɪˈfætɪɡəbəɫ]
Audio (US) (file)
Usage notes
Both fatigable and defatigable mean "able to be fatigued", but generally only fatigable is used in the medical sense (such as when referring to a reflex that is easily exhaustible/fatigable). Only in the word indefatigable (= in- + defatigable) does modern English regularly encounter a reminder of the rarer synonym of fatigable, but the word indefatigable tends to be used in a figurative sense (= remarkably persistent) rather than a literal/medical one (= remarkably immune to fatigue in the sense of having high physical fitness). The prefix de- in defatigable appears in its intensifying sense, not in its undoing sense.
References
- Websters 1902.
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