capacious
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: ipa: /kəˈpeɪʃəs/
rhymes: -eɪʃəs
Forms: form: more capacious
form: most capacious
Etymology: From Latin capāx (“wide, spacious, large; capable”) + -ious. Displaced native Old English numol.
Senses: examples: text: I turnd my thoughts, and with capacious mind / Conſiderd all things viſible in Heav'n
ref: 1667, John Milton, “Book VIII”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC:
text: ‘There’s rummer things than women in this world though, mind you,’ said the man with the black eye, slowly filling a large Dutch pipe, with a most capacious bowl.
ref: 1836 March – 1837 October, Charles Dickens, “Comprising a brief Description of the Company at the Peacock assembled; and a Tale told by a Bagman”, in The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1837, →OCLC:
text: The Malabar, that huge sea monster, in whose capacious belly so many human creatures lived and suffered, had dwindled to a walnut-shell, and yet beside her bulk how infinitely small had their own frail cockboat appeared as they shot out from under her towering stern!
ref: 1874, Marcus Clarke, chapter V, in For the Term of His Natural Life:
text: There comes an end to all things; the most capacious measure is filled at last; and this brief condescension to my evil finally destroyed the balance of my soul.
ref: 1886 January 5, Robert Louis Stevenson, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., →OCLC:
text: “Do I fidget you ?” he asked apologetically, whilst his long bony fingers buried themselves, string, knots, and all, into the capacious pockets of his magnificent tweed ulster.
ref: 1904–1905, Baroness Orczy [i.e., Emma Orczy], chapter 1, in The Case of Miss Elliott, London: T[homas] Fisher Unwin, published 1905, →OCLC; republished as popular edition, London: Greening & Co., 1909, OCLC 11192831, quoted in The Case of Miss Elliott (ebook no. 2000141h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg of Australia, February 2020:
text: Profitable operation is being made possible by the widespread introduction of capacious diesel railcars, which for their comfort and speed are very popular with the travelling public.
ref: 1953 April, “Reviving U.S.A. Passenger Traffic”, in Railway Magazine, page 218:
text: The only outfit I could conjure up was a capacious linen shift and a saggy cotton-wool cardigan.
ref: 2025 July 7, Annie Lowrey, “I Fought Plastic. Plastic Won.”, in The Atlantic, →ISSN:
synonyms: ample
commodious
roomy
spacious
voluminous
glosses: Having a lot of space inside; roomy.
examples: text: [T]he fresh brave school-life, so full of games, adventures, and good fellowship, so ready at forgetting, so capacious at enjoying, so bright at forecasting, outweighed a thousandfold their troubles with the master of their form, and the occasional ill-usage of the big boys in the house.
ref: 1857, [Thomas Hughes], “The War of Independence”, in Tom Brown’s School Days. […], Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Macmillan & Co., →OCLC, part I, page 185:
text: As you will read, Trump himself has a capacious understanding of his power.
ref: 2025 April 28, Jeffrey Goldberg, “Signalgate, Trump, and The Atlantic”, in The Atlantic, →ISSN:
glosses: Capable, able.
Derived terms: capaciously
capaciousness
incapacious
uncapacious
Related terms: capable
capacity