unˈwedgeable, a.
[un-1 7 b.]
Incapable of being split by wedges; uncleavable.
In mod. use only in echoes of the Shakes. passage, with a tendency towards the wider meaning ‘very hard, stubborn, or difficult to deal with’: freq. used by Carlyle.
| 1603 Shakes. Meas. for M. ii. ii. 116 Mercifull heauen, Thou rather with thy sharpe and sulpherous bolt Splits the vn-wedgable and gnarled Oke, Then the soft Mertill. [1802–12 Bentham Ration. Judic. Evid. (1827) V. 521 Men, like oaks, are..‘gnarled and unwedgeable;’ facts, like deals, are fissile.] 1837 Carlyle Misc. (1840) V. 135 He, being unwedgeable, has remained in antiquarian cabinets. 1880 Spectator 5 June 722 Propositions which lie buried in these gnarled and unwedgeable periods. |