honourable

From Middle English honourable, from Old French honorable, honurable, from Latin honōrābilis, from honōrō (“I honour”); cognate with Italian onorabile, Spanish honorable. By surface analysis, honour +‎ -able. In this sense, largely displaced Old English ārfæst.

honourable (comparative more honourable, superlative most honourable)

1. UK standard spelling of honorable.
   • 1846, George Luxford, Edward Newman, The Phytologist: a popular botanical miscellany: Volume 2, Part 2, page 474:

     It was aptly said by Newton that "whatever is not deduced from facts must be regarded as hypothesis," but hypothesis appears to us a title too honourable for the crude guessings to which we allude.

honourable (plural honourables)

1. UK standard spelling of honorable.
   • 1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC:

     So she invites her father and sister to a second day's dinner (if those sides, or ontrys, as she calls 'em, weren't served yesterday, I'm d—d), and to meet City folks and littery men, and keeps the Earls and the Ladies, and the Honourables to herself.