Tractility
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 The quality of being tractile (capable of being drawn or stretched out at length). uncountable
"1673, Robert Boyle, Essays of the Strange Subtilty, Great Efficacy, Determinate Nature of Effluviums, London: M. Pitt, “If the Strange Subtilty of Effluviums,” Chapter 2, p. 8, Silver, whose Ductility and Tractility are very much inferiour to those of Gold, was, by my procuring, drawn out to so slender a Wire, that, when we measur’d it, which was somewhat troublesom to do, with a long and accurate measure, we found, that eight Yards of it did not yet fully counterpoise one Grain:"
Example
More examples"1673, Robert Boyle, Essays of the Strange Subtilty, Great Efficacy, Determinate Nature of Effluviums, London: M. Pitt, “If the Strange Subtilty of Effluviums,” Chapter 2, p. 8, Silver, whose Ductility and Tractility are very much inferiour to those of Gold, was, by my procuring, drawn out to so slender a Wire, that, when we measur’d it, which was somewhat troublesom to do, with a long and accurate measure, we found, that eight Yards of it did not yet fully counterpoise one Grain:"
Etymology
From tractile + -ity.
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.