- a substance that causes death or harm if it gets into the body
- Some mushrooms contain a deadly poison.
- How did he die? Was it poison?
- The dog was killed by rat poison (= poison intended to kill rats).
- to hunt with poison arrows
- bombs containing poison gas
- She had laced his drink with poison.
Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadjective- potent
- powerful
- strong
- …
- trace
- administer
- give somebody
- inject
- …
- gas
- pill
- arrow
- …
- an idea, a feeling, etc. that is extremely harmful
- the poison of racial hatred
Extra Examples- These words were pure poison to me.
- groups that are spreading the poison of sectarianism
Word OriginMiddle English (denoting a harmful medicinal draught): from Old French poison ‘magic potion’, from Latin potio(n-) ‘potion’, related to potare ‘to drink’.
Idioms
See poison in the Oxford Advanced American DictionarySee poison in the Oxford Learner's Dictionary of Academic Englishone man’s meat is another man’s poison
- (saying) used to say that different people like different things; what one person likes very much, another person does not like at all
what’s your poison?
- (old-fashioned, informal, humorous) used to ask somebody what alcoholic drink they would like
Check pronunciation:
poison