Etymologically
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drug

This is the current revision of this entry, as edited by bogdan on 15 October 2026 at 18:28. This address is a permanent link to this version.
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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /drʌɡ/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English drogge,[2][3] borrowed from Old French drogue, droge “supply, stock, provision”,[4][2] which is of uncertain or unknown origin.[4][5][6] It may come from Middle Dutch or Middle Low German droge-vate “dry barrels”, or droge waere “dry wares”, with the first element taken for the name of the contents,[4][2][3] or because medicines were mostly dried herbs;[4] droge is the source of dry.[2] Italian and Spanish droga and Swedish drog have the same source.[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

An original medicinal substance: 1327 in the OED,[7] the early 14th century in Anglo-French and the late 14th in English,[4] about 1387–95 in Chaucer's General Prologue in Barnhart.[2]

Semantic evolution

In the 14th and 15th centuries drogge was confused with dragge, a spice mixture.[2] The word was linked with poisons from the 1500s,[4][2] and the specific application to narcotics and opiates is from the 1880s (1883 in the OED).[2][7] The phrase a drug on the market, a thing that has lost its value, is from the mid-17th century;[4][7] its connection is doubtful, and it may be a different word, perhaps a play on drag, sometimes written drug from about 1240 to 1800.[4] The verb, “to mix with a drug, especially a poison”, is from 1605, in Shakespeare's Macbeth,[2][3] and “to dose a person with drugs, especially to stupefy them” from 1730.[2][4] Druggist is from 1611, drugstore is American English from 1810,[2] and druggie is by 1968.[4]

Timeline

  • 1327 – a medicinal substance.[7]
  • 1500s – associated with poisons.[4][2]
  • 1605 – verb, to mix with a drug.[2]
  • 1611 – druggist.[2]
  • mid-17th century – a drug on the market.[4]
  • 1730 – verb, to dose with drugs.[2][4]
  • 1810 – drugstore.[2]
  • 1883 – a narcotic.[7]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A substance used as a medicine or in making medicines.
  2. A substance taken for its effect on the mind, especially an illegal or addictive one, such as a narcotic.
  3. Something no longer wanted: a drug on the market.

Verb

  1. To give a drug to, especially to make unconscious.
  2. To add a drug to food or drink.
  • druggist
  • drugstore
  • dry
  • drogue

Usage notes

A separate dialect noun drug, a low truck for carrying timber, from the 17th century, is related to the old verb drug, “to drag”.[6][7]

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  5. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  7. ^ a b c d e f Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press