dry

• drie (obsolete)

Adjective and noun from Middle English drye, dryge, drüȝe, from Old English drȳġe (“dry; parched, withered”), from Proto-West Germanic *drūgī, *draugī, from Proto-Germanic *drūgiz, *draugiz (“dry, hard”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰerǵʰ- (“to strengthen; become hard”), from *dʰer- (“to hold, support”). The verb derives from Middle English drien, from Old English drȳġan (“to dry”), from Proto-West Germanic *drūgijan, from Proto-Germanic *drūgiz (“hard, desiccated, dry”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰerǵʰ- (“strong, hard, solid”).

• enPR: drī, IPA^(key): /dɹaɪ/, [d͡ʒɹaɪ̯], [d̠͡ɹ̠˔aɪ̯], [d̠͡ɹ̠˔ʷaɪ̯]

• Audio (US):

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• Rhymes: -aɪ

dry (comparative drier or dryer, superlative driest or dryest)

1. Free from or lacking moisture.

   This towel's dry. Could you wet it and cover the chicken so it doesn't go dry as it cooks?

   • 1716 March 16 (Gregorian calendar), Joseph Addison, “The Free-holder: No. 22. Monday, March 5. [1716.]”, in The Works of the Right Honourable Joseph Addison, Esq; […], volume IV, London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], published 1721, →OCLC:

     The weather, […] we […] both agreed, was too dry for the season.

   • 1850, Harper's Magazine, volume 1, page 449:

     The marjorum stood in ruddy and fragrant masses; harebells and campanulas of several kinds, that are cultivated in our gardens, with bells large and clear; crimson pinks; the Michaelmas daisy; a plant with a thin, radiated yellow flower, of the character of an aster; a centaurea of a light purple, handsomer than any English one; a thistle in the dryest places, resembling an eryngo, with a thick, bushy top; mulleins, yellow and white; the wild mignonnette, and the white convolvulus; and clematis festooning the bushes, recalled the flowery fields and lanes of England, and yet told us that we were not there.

   • 1855–1858, William H[ickling] Prescott, History of the Reign of Philip the Second, King of Spain, volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Boston, Mass.: Phillips, Sampson, and Company, →OCLC:

     Not a dry eye was to be seen in the assembly.

   • 2021 July 20, Jack Healy, Sophie Kasakove, “A Drought So Dire That a Utah Town Pulled the Plug on Growth”, in The New York Times‎^[1], →ISSN:

     It is one of the first towns in the United States to purposely stall growth for want of water in a new era of megadroughts. But it could be a harbinger of things to come in a hotter, drier West.

3. Unable to produce a liquid, as water, (petrochemistry) oil, or (agriculture) milk.

   Hyponym: non-milch

   This well is as dry as that cow.

4. (masonry) Built without or lacking mortar.
   • 1937 September 21, J[ohn] R[onald] R[euel] Tolkien, “The Gathering of the Clouds”, in The Hobbit: Or There and Back Again, revised edition, New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, published February 1966 (August 1967 printing), →OCLC, page 247:

     [A]lready the gate was blocked with a wall of squared stones laid dry, but very thick and very high, across the opening.

5. (chemistry) Anhydrous: free from or lacking water in any state, regardless of the presence of other liquids.

   Dry alcohol is 200 proof.

6. (figurative) Athirst, eager.
   • 1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]:

     Prospero: […] Confederates / (ſo drie he was for Sway) with King of Naples / To giue him Annuall tribute, doe him homage / Subiect his Coronet, to his Crowne and bend / The Dukedom yet vnbow'd (alas poore Millaine) / To moſt ignoble ſtooping.

7. Free from or lacking alcohol or alcoholic beverages.

   Of course it's a dry house. He was an alcoholic but he's been dry for almost a year now.

   • c. 1601–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Twelfe Night, or What You Will”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene v]:

     Ol. Go too, y'are a dry foole: Ile no more of you: besides you grow dis-honest.
     Clo. Two faults Madona, that drinke & good counsell wil amend: for giue the dry foole drink, then is the foole not dry […]

8. (law) Describing an area where sales of alcoholic or strong alcoholic beverages are banned.

   You'll have to drive out of this dry county to find any liquor.

9. Free from or lacking embellishment or sweetness, particularly:
   • 1733, [Alexander Pope], An Essay on Man. […], (please specify |epistle=I to IV), London: Printed for J[ohn] Wilford, […], →OCLC:

     These epistles will become less dry, more susceptible of ornament.

   1. (wine and other alcoholic beverages, ginger ale) Low in sugar; lacking sugar; unsweetened.

      Proper martinis are made with London dry gin and dry vermouth.

      • 1983, Lorenzo Semple Jr., Never Say Never Again:

        Fatima Blush: Oh, how reckless of me. I made you all wet.
        James Bond: Yes, but my martini is still dry. My name is James.

   2. (humor) Amusing without showing amusement.

      Steven Wright has a deadpan delivery, Norm Macdonald has a dry sense of humor, and Oscar Wilde had a dry wit.

   3. Lacking interest, boring.

      A dry lecture may require the professor to bring a water gun in order to keep the students' attention.

      • c. 1601–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “Twelfe Night, or What You Will”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene v]:

        Ol. Go too, y'are a dry foole: Ile no more of you: besides you grow dis-honest.
        Clo. Two faults Madona, that drinke & good counsell wil amend: for giue the dry foole drink, then is the foole not dry […]

      • 1907, Ronald M. Burrows, The Discoveries In Crete, page 2:

        Mr. Evans naturally does not see things in a dry light. He has the dramatic instinct, and impresses it on all he touches.

      • 2012, Winston S. Churchill, Martin Gilbert, Churchill: The Power of Words, page 14:

        But there we were given only the dullest, driest, pemmicanised forms like The Student's Hume, Once I had a hundred pages of The Student's Hume as a holiday task.

   4. (poker) Of a board or flop: Not permitting the creation of many or of strong hands.

      Jake was hoping to make something good out of his suited 7-8 hand, but the flop came out dry: 2-5-10 rainbow, and all of the wrong suit!.

   5. (fine arts) Exhibiting precise execution lacking delicate contours or soft transitions of color.
10. (aviation) Not using afterburners or water injection for increased thrust.

    This fighter jet's engine has a maximum dry thrust of 200 kilonewtons.

11. (sciences, somewhat derogatory) Involving computations rather than work with biological or chemical matter.
12. (of a sound recording) Free from applied audio effects (especially reverb).
14. Without a usual complement or consummation; impotent.

    never dry fire a bow

    dry humping her girlfriend

    making a dry run

    • 1958, Gordon Grimley, The Book of the Bow, page 167:

      A loose nocking point is equally dangerous since it may result in what is known as a 'dry release' when the arrow merely falls from a string a few feet away as the bow is shot. This may distort or weaken the bow.

    • 1992, Pennsylvania Game News, volume 63, page 57:

      […] most like "dry firing," or a dry release, wherein the string meets no resistance.

    • 1992, Dwight R. Schuh, Bowhunter's Encyclopedia, Stackpole Books, →ISBN, page 81:

      When you shoot a bow, the arrow absorbs a high percentage of the energy released by the limbs. If you dry fire a bow (shoot it with no arrow on the string), the bow itself absorbs all the energy, […]

    • 2015, Naoko Takei Moore, Kyle Connaughton, Donabe: Classic and Modern Japanese Clay Pot Cooking, Ten Speed Press, →ISBN, page 8:

      Because some recipes require specific techniques such as high-intensity dry heating (heating while the pot is empty or heating with little or no fluid inside), read the manufacturer's instructions to ensure your vessel can handle such cooking […]

    1. Of a bite from an animal: not containing the usual venom.
15. (Christianity) Of a mass, service, or rite: involving neither consecration nor communion.
16. (Malaysia, Singapore, of noodles) Mixed with sauce and not served in a soup.
    • 2006 July 30, Teo Pau Lin, quoting Wong Hon Mun, The Straits Times, quoted in Jack Tsen-Ta Lee, A Dictionary of Singlish and Singapore English, Singapore: Singapore Press Holdings Limited, page L28:

      I would have mee tai mak (short, thick noodles), either in soup or dry, with fishballs, pork balls or yong tau foo at this noodles shop near my house.

• (free from liquid or moisture): See Thesaurus:dry

• (antonym(s) of “free from liquid or moisture”): See Thesaurus:wet
• (antonym(s) of “abstinent from or banning alcohol”): wet
• (antonym(s) of “not using afterburners or water injection”): wet
• (antonym(s) of “of a scientist or lab: doing computation”): wet

• Sranan Tongo: drei

dry (plural drys or dries)

1. The process by which something is dried.

   This towel is still damp: I think it needs another dry.

2. (US) A prohibitionist (of alcoholic beverages).
   • c. 1952-1996, Noah S. Sweat, quoted in 1996

     The drys were as unhappy with the second part of the speech as the wets were with the first half.

3. An area with little or no rain, or sheltered from it.

   Come under my umbrella and keep in the dry.

4. (chiefly Australia, with "the") The dry season.
   • 1938, Xavier Herbert, chapter VII, in Capricornia‎^[2], New York: D. Appleton-Century, published 1943, page 91:

     […] one was sodden to the bone and mildewed to the marrow and moved to pray […] for that which formerly he had cursed—the Dry! the good old Dry—when the grasses yellowed, browned, dried to tinder, burst into spontaneous flame— […]

   • 2006, Alexis Wright, Carpentaria, Giramondo, published 2012, page 169:

     [T]he spring-fed river systems. Not the useless little tributary jutting off into a mud hole at the end of the Dry.

5. (Australia) An area of waterless country.
6. Unsweetened ginger ale; dry ginger.
   • 1968, Bee Gees, “Indian Gin And Whiskey Dry”, in Idea(album)‎^[3]:

     All day, all night you feel as if the Earth could fly/Three more all for fine Indian Gin and whiskey dry.

   • 2018 May 2, pyatts, Tripadvisor‎^[4]:

     Can you buy dry ginger in Croatia? If not what is an alternative?

   • 2021 July 26, cub_beer, “Archived copy”, in eBay‎^[5], archived from the original on 31 July 2021:

     Black Douglas Blended Scotch and Dry Case 24 x 375mL Cans (Title).

7. (British, UK politics) A radical or hard-line Conservative; especially, one who supported the policies of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s.

   Antonym: wet

dry (third-person singular simple present dries, present participle drying, simple past and past participle dried)

1. (intransitive) To lose moisture.

   Synonyms: dehydrate, desiccate

   Hyponyms: (loosely synonymous) dry out, dry up

   The clothes dried on the line.

   The fruit dried in the dehydrator.

2. (transitive) To remove moisture from.

   Synonyms: dehydrate, desiccate

   Hyponyms: (loosely synonymous) dry out, dry up

   Devin dried her eyes with a handkerchief.

   We dried the fruit in the dehydrator.

3. (transitive, figurative) To exhaust; to cause to run dry.

   Synonym: dry up

4. (intransitive, informal, theater) For an actor to forget their lines while performing.
   • 1986, Richard Collier, Make-believe: The Magic of International Theatre, page 146:

     An actor never stumbled over his lines, he “fluffed”; he never forgot his dialogue, he “dried.”

   • 2006, Michael Dobson, Performing Shakespeare's Tragedies Today, page 126:

     In one of the previews I dried (lost my lines) in my opening scene, 1.4, and had to improvise.

   • 2024 June 1, John Phipps, “The lamentable true history of the Red Hamlet”, in FT Weekend, Life & Arts, page 18:

     Blinded to the astonishment of a thousand spectators by the force of the footlights, [Derek] Jacobi realised he'd dried. Dried completely. It wasn't like he'd forgotten the words. It was like he'd never known them.

• desiccant
• desiccate
• desiccation

• YRD

• dryn

From Proto-Albanian *drūna, from the same root as dru. Cognate to Sanskrit द्रुणा (druṇā, “bow”), Persian درونه (“rainbow”).^[1]

dry m (plural dryna, definite dryni, definite plural drynat)

1. lock, bolt

• dru
• drushtë
• ndryj

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium. Particularly: “From English dry "lacking interest, boring" or by some interpretation of wet "to go clubbing"?”)

• IPA^(key): /t͡ʃɹaːi̯⁵⁵/

dry (Hong Kong Cantonese)

1. (of a person) lacking sex or romance

dry

1. Alternative form of drye

Borrowed from a Brythonic language, from Proto-Brythonic *drüw, from Proto-Celtic *druwits (“druid”).

• IPA^(key): /dryː/

drȳ m (nominative plural drȳas)

1. wizard, sorcerer
   • late 10th century, Ælfric, "Passion of St. Julian and his wife Basilissa"

     Gehelp urum godum and hat to þe gefeccan þisne dry Iulianum þe ure goda anlicnysse mid ealle to-brytte...

     Help our gods, and command men to bring thee this sorcerer Julianus, who hath utterly broken the images of our gods,...

   • Hīe woldon forbærnan þone drȳ. ― They wanted to burn the wizard. (Ælfric’s Homilies, volume 1.)

Strong a-stem:

• drȳcræft
• drȳeċġe

• Middle English: dri, driȝ, dry
  • ⇒ Middle English: driȝmann, driȝmenn pl

Unadapted borrowing from English dry.

dry m or f or n (indeclinable)

1. dry (about drinks)

• (North Wales) IPA^(key): /drɨː/
• (South Wales) IPA^(key): /driː/

dry

1. Soft mutation of try.