/dɹɪŋk/, [d̠ɹ̠˔ʷɪŋk]
OriginFrom Middle English drinken, from Old English drincan (“to drink, swallow up, engulf”), from Proto-West Germanic *drinkan, from Proto-Germanic *drinkaną (“to drink”), of uncertain origin; possibly from Proto-Indo-European *dʰrenǵ- (“to draw into one's mouth, sip, gulp”), nasalised variant of *dʰreǵ- (“to draw, glide”).
Cognates
Cognate with Yola drink (“to drink”), North Frisian drank, drainke, drink, drinke (“to drink”), West Frisian drinke (“to drink”), Alemannic German trénge, trenhu, trinche, tringhien, trinke (“to drink”), Bavarian dringa, trinckn, trinkhn, trinkn (“to drink”), Cimbrian trinkan, trinkhan (“to drink”), Dutch, Low German drinken (“to drink”), German, Mòcheno trinken (“to drink”), Luxembourgish drénken (“to drink”), Yiddish טרינקען (trinken, “to drink”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål drikke (“to drink”), Elfdalian drikka (“to drink”), Faroese, Icelandic drekka (“to drink”), Jutish drenk (“to drink”), Norwegian Nynorsk drikka, drikke (“to drink”), Swedish dricka (“to drink”), Gothic 𐌳𐍂𐌹𐌲𐌺𐌰𐌽 (drigkan, “to drink”), Vandalic drincan (“to drink”), French trinquer (“to booze, drink alcohol”), Italian trincare (“to knock back (a drink)”), Spanish trincar (“to get drunk”).
- ambitransitiveTo consume (a liquid) through the mouth.
“He drank the water I gave him.”
“You can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink.”
“[…] There liues ſhee with the bleſſed Gods in bliſſe: / There drinks the Nectar with Ambroſia mixt […]”
- metonymically, transitiveTo consume the liquid contained within (a bottle, glass, etc.).
“Jack drank the whole bottle by himself.”
- intransitiveTo consume alcoholic beverages.
“You've been drinking, haven't you?”
“No thanks, I don't drink.”
“Everyone who is drinking is drinking, but not everyone who is drinking is drinking.”
- transitiveTo take in (a liquid), in any manner; to suck up; to absorb; to imbibe.
“Let the purple violets drink the stream.”
- transitiveTo take in; to receive within one, through the senses; to inhale; to hear; to see.
“My ears have not yet drunk a hundred words / Of that tongue's utterance.”
“to drink the cooler air”
- archaic, transitiveTo toast (someone or something) with a drink, honour; to wish well (see drink to), especially
“Drink to lofty hopes that cool —
Visions of a perfect State : Drink we, last, the public fool,
Frantic love and frantic hate.”
- archaic, transitiveTo express one's desire for the accomplishment of a toast, sentiment or event, to wish, hope (for), forward (especially as 'to drink the health (of someone)').
“At the same time were great Acclamations & they drunk Damnation to Dʳ. Sacheverell, Mʳ Tilly, and all the Dʳˢ friends.”
“I ought not to have neglected a request of one of my correspondents so long as I have; but I dare say I have given him time to add practice to profession. He sent me some time ago a bottle or two of e”
- archaic, obsolete, transitivewith to ‘someone or something’
“Had our great Pall ace the capacity
To Campe this hoſt, we all would ſup together,
And drinke Carowſes to the next dayes Fate
Which promiſes Royall perill, Trumpetters
With brazen dinne blaſt you the ”
- obsolete, transitiveTo smoke, as tobacco.
“And some men now live ninety yeeres and past,
Who never dranke tobacco first nor last.”
- Used in phrasal verbs: drink down, drink in, drink off, drink out, drink to, drink up.
- countable, uncountableA beverage.
“I’d like another drink please.”
- uncountableDrinks in general; something to drink.
“For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink”
“These sources do not, however, state why the drink is called lambswool. The name comes from the way the apples are roasted until they split open, and their pulp froths over the skin; this is used to f”
- countable, uncountableA type of beverage (usually mixed).
“My favourite drink is the White Russian.”
- countable, uncountableA (served) alcoholic beverage.
- countable, uncountableThe action of drinking, especially with the verbs take or have.
“He was about to take a drink from his root beer.”
- countable, uncountableAlcoholic beverages in general.
“She mixed furniture with the same fatal profligacy as she mixed drinks, and this outrageous contact between things which were intended by Nature to be kept poles apart gave her an inexpressible thrill”
“By the late twenties father has died of drink and his wife is left to raise their two sons.”
“The face of work is a drunk man in the same chair, chewing on the same bone for five thousand nights. The face of work is a, coffee cup in hand, frustrated: "You don't get it. They all don't get it. Y”
- countable, uncountableA standard drink.
“A drink of wine is about 5 ounces”
“And when (SUBJECT) was 55, would you say (he/she) drank more than, less than, or about 2 to 3 drinks a day?”
- colloquial, countable, uncountableAny body of water.
“If he doesn't pay off the mafia, he’ll wear cement shoes to the bottom of the drink!”
“When in mid-Channel the speed slowed and I was informed by A.C. Russell that another dinghy had been spotted. This turned out to contain a Canadian fighter pilot who had been in the drink for three da”
“In seconds, we went from sitting in a boat to threading ice-cold water. I wasn't wearing a life jacket and am not the best paddler, but there I was, in the drink, splashing around.”
- Australia, countable, figuratively, uncountableA downpour; a cloudburst; a rainstorm; a deluge; a lot of rain.
“Now this is going to bring some huge totals of rainfall with it—200 to 400 millimetres with it—and along with that, these winds—gusts to 275 kilometres an hour near the cyclone [Cyclone Ilsa] core—and”
- countable, informal, uncountableAmount.
“He [a sea-serpent] was giant, massive. A huge drink of man-eater. But even now, you know, I could take him.”
Formsdrinks(present, singular, third-person) · drinking(participle, present) · drank(past) · drunk(Southern-US, past) · drinked(nonstandard, past) · drunk(participle, past) · drunken(archaic, participle, past) · drank(dialectal, participle, past) · drinked(archaic, nonstandard, obsolete, participle, past) · drinken(participle, past) · dranken(participle, past) · dhrink(alternative) · drank(alternative) · drinck(alternative) · drinke(alternative) · thrink(alternative) · drinks(plural)