• (British, America) IPA: /dɹʌɡ/, [d̠͡ɹ̠˔ʷʌɡ]

From Middle English drogge, from Old French drogue, drocque, from Middle Dutch - or Middle Low German droge, as in droge vate, mistaking droge for the contents, which were usually dried herbs, plants or wares.

drug (plural drugs)

1. (pharmacology) A substance used to treat an illness, relieve a symptom, or modify a chemical process in the body for a specific purpose.

   Synonyms: Thesaurus:pharmaceutical

   Aspirin is a drug that reduces pain, acts against inflammation and lowers body temperature.

   The revenues from both brand-name drugs and generic drugs have increased.

   • 1667, John Milton, “Book II”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC ↗; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC ↗:

     whence merchants bring their spicy drugs

2. A psychoactive substance, especially one which is illegal and addictive, ingested for recreational use, such as cocaine.

   Synonyms: Thesaurus:recreational drug

   take drugs

   she used to be a drug addict

   • March 1991, unknown student, "Antihero opinion", SPIN, page 70 ↗

     You have a twelve-year-old kid being told from the time he's like five years old that all drugs are bad, they're going to screw you up, don't try them. Just say no. Then they try pot.

3. Anything, such as a substance, emotion or action, to which one is addicted.
   • 2005, Jack Haas, Om, Baby!: a Pilgrimage to the Eternal Self, page 8:

     Inspiration is my drug. Such things as spirituality, booze, travel, psychedelics, contemplation, music, dance, laughter, wilderness, and ribaldry — these have simply been the different forms of the drug of inspiration for which I have had great need […]

   • 2010, Kesha Rose Sebert (Ke$ha), with Pebe Sebert and Joshua Coleman (Ammo), Your Love is My Drug
4. Any commodity that lies on hand, or is not salable; an article of slow sale, or in no demand.
   • 1685, John Dryden, Albion and Albanius:

     And virtue shall a drug become.

   • 1742, Henry Fielding, “A Pleasant Discourse between the Two Parsons and the Bookseller, […]”, in The History of the Adventures of Joseph Andrews, and of His Friend Mr. Abraham Adams. […], volume I, London: […] A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC ↗, book I, page 117 ↗:

     […] Sermons are mere Drugs. The Trade is ſo vaſtly ſtocked vvith them, that really unleſs they come out vvith the Name of VVhitfield [i.e, George Whitefield] or VVeſtley [John Wesley], or ſome other ſuch great Man, as a Biſhop, or thoſe ſort of People, I don't care to touch, […]

5. (North America, informal) Short for drugstore.
   • 1980, Stephen King, The Mist:

     “I’ll go this far,” I answered him. “We’ll try going over to the drug. You, me, Ollie if he wants to go, one or two others. Then we’ll talk it over again.”

• French: drogue
• German: Arznei, Droge, Medikament
• Russian: лека́рство
• Spanish: droga, fármaco

• French: drogue
• German: Droge, Rauschgift, Rauschmittel, Betäubungsmittel (officialese)
• Italian: droga, stupefacente
• Portuguese: droga, narcótico
• Russian: нарко́тик
• Spanish: droga, narcótico

drug (drugs, present participle drugging; simple past and past participle drugged)

1. (transitive) To administer intoxicating drugs to, generally without the recipient's knowledge or consent.

   She suddenly felt strange, and only then realized she'd been drugged.

2. (transitive) To add intoxicating drugs to with the intention of drugging someone.

   She suddenly felt strange. She realized her drink must have been drugged.

3. (intransitive) To prescribe or administer drugs or medicines.
   • 1610 (first performance), Ben[jamin] Jonson, The Alchemist, London: […] Thomas Snodham, for Walter Burre, and are to be sold by Iohn Stepneth, […], published 1612, →OCLC ↗; reprinted Menston, Yorkshire: The Scolar Press, 1970, →OCLC ↗, (please specify the GB page), (please specify the scene number in lowercase Roman numerals) ↗:

     Past all the doses of your drugging doctors

• French: droguer
• Spanish: drogar, endrogar

• Italian: drogare

Germanic ablaut formation. If old, a doublet of drew, from Middle English drug, drog, drugh, drogh, from Old English dragan, from Proto-Germanic *draganą; compare Dutch droeg, German trug, Swedish drog.

1. (dialectal) Simple past tense and past participle of drag

   You look like someone drug you behind a horse for half a mile.

   look what the cat drug in

   • 1961, Kurt Vonnegut, Harrison Bergeron:

     […] their faces were masked, so that no one, seeing a free and graceful gesture or a pretty face, would feel like something the cat drug in.

drug (plural drugs)

1. (obsolete) A drudge.
   • c. 1605–1608, William Shakespeare, “The Life of Tymon of Athens”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act IV, scene iii]:

     Hadst thou, like us from our first swath, proceeded / The sweet degrees that this brief world affords / To such as may the passive drugs of it / Freely command, thou wouldst have plunged thyself / In general riot