Liable

How to spell liable

6 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce liable

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does liable mean?

1. adjectiveLegally responsible for something, and so bound to pay or answer for it.
2. adjectiveLikely or apt to do something, often something undesirable.

Liable in a sentence

• The company was held liable for the faulty wiring.

• Old pipes are liable to burst during a hard frost.

• As a director, she is personally liable for those unpaid taxes.

• Without a backup, the file is liable to be lost in a crash.

Where does liable come from?

Language of origin: Latin

Liable comes from the idea of being bound or tied to an obligation. It traces back to the Latin verb ligare, which literally meant 'to bind' or 'to tie', and reached English through Anglo-French, where forms of the verb lier carried the sense of being bound by law or duty. By the 1400s the adjective was used in English to describe a person who was bound to answer for something, especially a debt or a legal duty, and from there it broadened to mean 'apt to' or 'likely to' suffer or do something. The same ligare root binds together a surprising family of English words, including 'ligament', 'liaison', 'ally', and 'rely', all of which share the underlying notion of tying or fastening. The spelling trap is the 'lia' sequence: it follows the same pattern as 'liaison', even though the word is pronounced as if it began with 'lie'.

How the word is built

• li- (from Latin ligare: to bind)
• -able (suffix: capable of, subject to)