Crossword clues for tenable
tenable
- Like an excellent argument
- That can be held
- Able to be defended
- Credible number left in Lincoln?
- Can be maintained
- Seemingly rational little gap in record
- Number clever enough for game show
- Defensible points accepted by board
- A number competent? That’s credible
- Readily defended
- Like a good argument
- Capable of being held
- Resistant to attack
- Possible to defend
- Not ridiculous, as an argument
- Logical, as a theory
- Like some positions
- Like a well-armed fort
- Like a solid theory
- Having merit, as a theory
- Hard to dispute, as a theory
- Easily argued
- Having some merit
- Easily defended
- Like a well-grounded argument
- Like good arguments
- Like a good debater's arguments
- Not easily debunked
- Like a sound argument
- Not bad, as an argument
- Sound, as an argument
- Like a solid argument
- Well-founded
- Solidly based
- Defensible
- Like a rational argument
- Like some arguments
- Like a good argument or theory
- Logical, as a theory (7)
- Like a rational theory
- Not like the Alamo
- Valid
- Like an excellent theory
- Like a valid defense
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Tenable \Ten"a*ble\ (t[e^]n"[.a]*b'l), a. [F. tenable, fr. tenir to hold, L. tenere. See Thin, and cf. Continue, Continent, Entertain, Maintain, Tenant, Tent.] Capable of being held, maintained, or defended, as against an assailant or objector, or against attempts to take or process; as, a tenable fortress, a tenable argument.
If you have hitherto concealed his sight,
Let it be tenable in your silence still.
--Shak.
I would be the last man in the world to give up his
cause when it was tenable.
--Sir W.
Scott.
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
"capable of being held or maintained," 1570s, from Middle French tenable, from Old French (12c.), from tenir "to hold," from Latin tenere "to hold, keep" (see tenet).
Wiktionary
a. 1 (context of a theory, argument etc English) capable of being maintained or justified; well-founded 2 (context of a defensive structure English) capable of being defended against assault or attack; defensible
WordNet
adj. based on sound reasoning or evidence; "a reasonable argument"; "well-founded suspicions" [syn: well-founded]
Wikipedia
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Usage examples of "tenable".
Concerning the ignis fatuus itself, some hold that it is due to phosphureted hydrogen gas - a tenable theory.
Towards seven in the morning the position was no longer tenable by the colonists, who accordingly took shelter in the borders of Jacamar Wood.
We propose to endow a studentship tenable by a young person from Slah for up to a quarter-score of years, to be devoted to any subject taught at our university.
For reasons of its own, the Terran Empire had decided that participatory democracy was the only tenable form of freedom.
Homilies are surely the work of a Catholic convert to Ebionitism, who thought he saw in the doctrine of the two powers the only tenable answer to Gnosticism.
True, a reason had been found for letting the Inglesi go, an outwardly tenable solution had presented itself and he, the Grand Duke, had taken advantage of it to rid the island of a troublesome business which might interfere with the tourist, and so indirectly with the smuggling, trade.
Such a suggestion is no longer so improbable as it seemed to be in 1901, when it was still a tenable theory that the new development of Egyptian art was due to Mesopotamian influence, and came from Mitanni with Queen Tyi, the wife of Amenhotep III.
Such at least was the old belief, but to hold that God, a timeless being, sits outside the universe and plans the ticktock of creation is no longer tenable.
Understandably bitter, the American military saw it as precluding success and, since they had small confidence in Vietnamization, making even a tenable settlement unlikely.
Black Bart. Of course, nobody knows what actually did happen, but the scientists came up with quite a tenable hypothesis.
That may be a tenable position in some cases, but in the present instance the nature of the affair justifies prompt action.
Invasion and occupation are not tenable options, but at this moment in time Second Fleet can bombard the planet from beyond the range of any weapon they possess.
It is certain that the soil is not tenable, and that the people are continually threatened with exactions as in a conquered country.
She squeaked shrilly at the others, and before Menolly realized it, all of them had seized some tenable part of the wherry and were exerting their efforts to pull it from the bogsand.
If this theory is to be logically tenable, self-evidence must not consist merely in the fact that we believe a proposition.