# alcohol

Pronunciation: US say "AL-kuh-hawl" /ˈæl.kə.hɔl/; UK say "AL-kuh-hol" /ˈæl.kə.hɒl/

## Noun

1. Beverages containing ethanol, taken together as a category: beer, wine, and distilled spirits.
   - Simple: Drinks such as beer, wine, and liquor that contain a substance making people drunk.
   - _The reception was dry, with no alcohol served at all._
   - _Many countries restrict the sale of alcohol to adults._
2. Ethanol: the intoxicating compound found in alcoholic beverages, also widely used as a solvent and disinfectant.
   - Simple: The substance in beer and wine that makes people drunk. Scientists call it ethanol.
   - _The lab stored alcohol in sealed containers away from any heat source._
   - _Some thermometers use colored alcohol instead of mercury._
3. Any of a class of organic compounds containing a hydroxyl functional group (-OH) bonded to a saturated carbon atom; examples include ethanol and methanol.
   - Simple: A kind of chemical built around a special oxygen-and-hydrogen part. Ethanol and methanol are two common ones.
   - _Ethanol is the alcohol most familiar to people, but the chemical family is large._
   - _Chemists classify each alcohol by the position of its hydroxyl group._

## Noun

4. A very fine powder, such as one produced by grinding or subliming a substance into minute particles. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: A very fine powder, ground or refined as small as it can go.

## Origin

First attested in the 15th century, alcohol came through Middle English alcofol and Middle French or Spanish alcohol, from a Medieval Latin form used in medical and alchemical writing, which itself came from Arabic al-kuḥl ('kohl'). It first meant stibnite, then broadened to any powder made by grinding a material, then to liquids obtained by distillation, before being specialized to mean spirit of wine (ethanol) in the 18th century and extended to its wider chemical sense after 1850. It is a doublet of alcool and kohl.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/alcohol (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).