a. [f. prec. + -ABLE.]
1. Of institutions, etc.: Liable to visitation by some competent authority; subject to official supervision or inspection.
1605. Coke, Reports, V. 15/2. All religious or Ecclesiastical houses, whereof the king was founder, are only visitable and corrigible by the kings ecclesiasticall Commission.
1661. J. Stephens, Procurations, 40. When those Religious persons … had relinquished their habit, rule, and order, for which they were visitable, then … the Visitation ceased.
1726. Ayliffe, Parergon, 295. All … Hospitals … built since the Reformation are Visitable by the King or Lord-Chancellor.
1767. Burn, Eccl. Law (ed. 2), IV. 12. Free chapels … being visitable only by commission from the king.
1873. Act 36 & 37 Vict., c. 39 § 4. In all cases such holder shall be visitable by the Visitor of the Chapter.
1895. Phillimore, Eccl. Law (ed. 2), 1061. Donatives and free chapels used to pay no procurations to any ecclesiastical ordinary, because they were not visitable by any.
2. Of places or persons: Capable of being visited; readily admitting of a visit.
In the first quot. perh. ‘worth visiting.’
a. 1701. Maundrell, Journ. Jerus. (1732), 104. In order to see the Sanctuaries, and other visitable places.
1837. New Monthly Mag., LI. 192. Richmond … might … thus be rendered visitable by tourists.
1842. Sir J. Graham in Illustr. Lond. News, 14 May, 7/1. The children easily visitable by their parents.
1876. Ruskin, St. Mark’s Rest, i. § 2. The most beautiful columns at present extant and erect in the conveniently visitable world.
1896. Advance (Chicago), 4 June, 811/1. The tropics are visitable in the winter only, and then the preacher is busiest.
transf. 1866. Miss Mulock, Noble Life, vi. His rank lifted him above the small proprietors who lived within visitable distance of the Castle.
3. Of persons: a. Capable of being visited on more or less equal terms by those of some standing in society; having some social position in a neighborhood.
1765. Cowper, Lett., 18 Oct. In about two months time after my arrival, I became known to all the visitable people here.
1835. Court Mag., VI. 186/1. The Orange Grove! I was not aware that visitable people ever resided there!
1851. Tupper, Castle Cornet, 309. The landlords, having no visitable neighbours, no society within many miles, are necessarily absentees.
1876. Geo. Eliot, Dan. Der., v. In a select party of thirty … few visitable families could be entirely left out.
b. Capable of being visited by a clergyman in the discharge of his pastoral duties.
1904. R. Small, Hist. U. P. Congregations, I. 474. In the southern division … there were only ninety visitable families at that time.
4. Such as admits of receiving visitors.
1864. Keble, Lett., in J. T. Coleridge, Mem. (1869), 486. Charlotte was not very much in visiting, or visitable order, during a great part of the time.
1876. Mrs. Whitney, Sights & Ins., II. xxv. 538. Her cold, or whatever it was, had affected her face and eyes; she was not really in visitable condition.
