a. Also 7 solvible, solveable. [f. SOLVE v. + -ABLE, or a. F. solvable.]
† 1. Able to pay; solvent. Obs.
1647. Fuller, Good Th. in Worse T., Pref. Many sufficient merchants, though not solvable for the present, make use of the latter [method]. Ibid. (1655), Ch. Hist. IX. 131. Although imprisonment was imposed by law on persons not solvable.
1672. Wycherley, Love in Wood, III. iv. 56. Widows are commonly so wise, as to be sure their men are solvable, before they trust ’em.
1773. Ann. Reg., 69. He immediately called an assembly of the deputies of the bank, from whom he obtained their consent to assist all the solvable houses.
† 2. Payable. Obs. rare.
1655. Fuller, Ch. Hist., VI. 326. Some of those Corrodies … were solvable out of the Exchequer.
3. Capable of being solved.
a. 1676. Hale, Orig. Man., I. ii. (1677), 56. I do not inquire how or where, because it is not solvible.
1681. Colvil, Whigs Supplic. (1751), 48. Solve several questions he can, Scarce solvable by any man.
1710. Brit. Apollo, III. No. 7. 2/2. You can answer all Questions solvable or not.
1785. Franklin, Lett., Wks. 1840, VI. 526. I have rarely met with a case of a smoky chimney, which has not been solvable on these principles.
1879. Proctor, Pleas. Ways Sci., iii. 56. The problem of determining the sun’s distance … had seemed fairly solvable in but one or two ways.
1896. Cayley, Coll. Math. Papers, XI. 402. A solvable case of the quintic equation.
4. Capable of being dissolved. Also absol.
1669. W. Simpson, Hydrol. Chym., 13. The solvent and solvable are both one.
1794. G. Adams, Nat. & Exper. Phil., I. xi. 460. From being insoluble in water, it is now not only solvable therein, but so greedy of moisture as [etc.].
5. Capable of being resolved into something.
1804–6. Syd. Smith, Mor. Philos. (1850), 368. The love of knowledge is solvable into some other passion at its origin.
Hence Solvableness.
1727. Bailey (vol. II.), Solvableness, ability to pay.
