incurable

From Old French incurable, from Late Latin incurabilis.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˌɪnˈkjʊəɹəbl/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˌɪnˈkjʊɹəbl/

• Audio:

  (file)

incurable (not comparable)

1. Of an illness, condition, etc, that is unable to be cured; healless.
   • 1854, James Stephen, On Desultory and Systematic Reading:

     They were labouring under a profound, and, as it might have seemed, an almost incurable ignorance.

2. (figuratively) Irremediable, incorrigible.

   an incurable romantic

• uncurable

• curable

• incurability
• terminal

incurable (plural incurables)

1. One who cannot be cured.
   • 1888, Rudyard Kipling, “The Phantom Rickshaw”, in The Phantom 'Rickshaw and Other Tales, Allahabad: A.H. Wheeler and Co., page 7:

     Heatherlegh, the Doctor, kept, in addition to his regular practice, a hospital on his private account — an arrangement of loose-boxes for Incurables, his friends called it — but it was really a sort of fitting-up shed for craft that had been damaged by stress of weather.

• binuclear

From Late Latin incurābilis. First attested in 1460.

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic)
• IPA^(key): (Valencia)
• Hyphenation: in‧cu‧ra‧ble

incurable m or f (masculine and feminine plural incurables)

1. incurable

   Synonym: inguarible

   Antonyms: curable, guarible

• “incurable”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies , April 2007
• “incurable” in Diccionari normatiu valencià, Acadèmia Valenciana de la Llengua.
• “incurable” in Diccionari català-valencià-balear, Antoni Maria Alcover and Francesc de Borja Moll, 1962.

Learned borrowing from Late Latin incūrābilis. By surface analysis, in- +‎ curable.

• IPA^(key): /ɛ̃.ky.ʁabl/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Audio (Switzerland):

  (file)

incurable (plural incurables)

1. incurable

   Synonym: inguérissable

   Antonyms: curable, guérissable, soignable

   Near-synonym: inopérable

• incurablement

• “incurable”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.

incurable m or f (plural incurables)

1. incurable

Borrowed from Late Latin incūrābilis.

• IPA^(key): /inkuˈɾable/
• Rhymes: -able
• Syllabification: in‧cu‧ra‧ble

incurable m or f (masculine and feminine plural incurables)

1. incurable

   Antonym: curable

• “incurable”, in Diccionario de la lengua española (in Spanish), online version 23.8, Royal Spanish Academy , 10 December 2024