excisable

Meanings

1. 1
   adj

   finance and law: liable to an excise duty or tax

   Importers must declare every excisable commodity before the shipment clears customs.

2. 2
   adj

   medicine or other technical use: capable of being removed by cutting out

   Imaging showed that the tumor was small and fully excisable.

Formed from excise + -able. The tax sense follows excise, an assessment borrowed through Dutch and French; the removable sense follows the unrelated verb excise, 'cut out,' from Latin excidere, from ex-, 'out,' + caedere, 'cut.' The shared spelling therefore hides two histories.

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