potion

Pluralpotions

Formspotions, potioning, potioned

1. 1
   nouncountable

   A small portion or dose of liquid intended as medicine, poison, or a magical drink.

   The healer prepared a bitter potion to bring down the child's fever.

   Old legends describe potions that could grant invisibility or eternal youth.

   Similarbrew, elixir, concoction, mixture, tonic

   Note

   Behind the word is Latin pōtiō, "a drinking," from pōtāre, "to drink," so a potion was first simply something drunk. The same Latin word also gave English poison, which makes the two doublets. That shared ancestry suits the sense's range: one liquid can heal, kill or enchant. Love potion is its most familiar fairy-tale collocation.

2. 2
   verbobsoletetransitive

   To drug someone, especially by giving them a doctored or poisoned drink.

   Note

   A verb English has let go: to potion someone was to dose them, often in secret. John Speed, writing in 1611 of Roger Mortimer's escape from the Tower of London, reports that Mortimer had "potioned" his keepers "with a sleepy drink." The person is the direct object, and the drink follows with. In modern writing, use drugged instead. The verb now turns up only in early texts.

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