heroin

heroin

See also: Heroin, heróín, and hê-rô-in

English

Etymology

Since the 1890s, from German Heroin, originally a trademark, from Ancient Greek ἥρως (hḗrōs, “hero”) and the suffix -in (“-ine”). Said to have been called thus to evoke quick and sweeping effect as a painkiller and cough suppressant (its original uses). Alternatively explained as a reference to the heroic school of medicine.[1]

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈhɛɹoʊ.ɪn/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Homophone: heroine
• Rhymes: -ɪn

Noun

heroin (countable and uncountable, plural heroins)

1. A powerful and addictive drug derived from opium producing intense euphoria. Classed as an illegal narcotic in most of the world. [from late 19th century]

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:heroin

   • 1967, Lou Reed (music), “Heroin”, in The Velvet Underground & Nico, performed by The Velvet Underground:

     Wow, that heroin is in my blood / And the blood is in my head / Yeah, thank God that I'm good as dead / Ooohhh, thank your God that I'm not aware / And thank God that I just don't care / And I guess I just don't know

   • 1972, Manny Rosen (lyrics), “King Heroin”, in There It Is, performed by James Brown:

     I saw a real strange, weird object / Standing up talking to the people / And I found out it was heroin / That deadly drug that go in your veins

   • 2009: Stuart Heritage, Hecklerspray, Friday the 22^nd of May in 2009 at 1 o’clock p.m., “Jon & Kate Latest: People You Don’t Know Do Crap You Don’t Care About”

     The reason why Jon & Kate Plus 8 is such a hot topic is because it might all be a sham. It’s been claimed that Jon has a string of mistresses, that Kate had an affair with her bodyguard and that Baby Number Six is actually a shaved Ewok with a catastrophic heroin addiction. Or something.

   • 2016, Tim Carvell; Josh Gondelman; Dan Gurewitch; Jeff Maurer; Ben Silva; Will Tracy; Jill Twiss; Seena Vali; Julie Weiner, “Opiods”, in Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, season 3, episode 27, HBO, Warner Bros. Television:

     Yeah, it does, though, it does. Heroin works basically everywhere because it’s heroin. It’s not a cellphone. Heroin has full coverage.

   • 2017, Tim Carvell; Josh Gondelman; Dan Gurewitch; Jeff Maurer; Ben Silva; Will Tracy; Jill Twiss; Seena Vali; Julie Weiner, “Confederacy”, in Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, season 4, episode 26, HBO, Warner Bros. Television:

     Okay, wel-, I’ll tell you where it stops: somewhere! Anytime someone asks, “Where does it stop?”, the answer is always fucking somewhere! You might let your kid have Twizzlers, but not inject black tar heroin! You d-You don’t just go, “Well, after the Twizzlers, where does it stop?”!

Synonyms

• (chemical names): diacetylmorphine, diamorphine
• (street names): Big H, boy, brown, bujj, dope, junk, H, horse, Ron, shit, skag, smack, train, yam yam

Translations

powerful and addictive drug

Arabic: هِيرُويْن‎ m (hiruyn) Armenian: հերոին (heroin) Basque: heroina (eu) Bulgarian: хероин m (heroin) Catalan: heroïna (ca) f Chinese: Cantonese: 海洛英 (hoi2 lok6 jing1), 白粉 (baak6 fan2), 灰 (fui1), 粉 (fan2), 四仔 (sei3 zai2) Mandarin: 海洛因 (zh) (hǎiluòyīn), 白麵／白面 (zh) (báimiàn), 白麵兒／白面儿 (zh) (báimiànr), 白粉 (zh) (báifěn) Czech: heroin m Danish: heroin c Dutch: heroïne (nl) f Esperanto: heroino Estonian: heroiin Faroese: heroin Finnish: heroiini (fi) French: héroïne (fr) f Galician: heroína f German: Heroin (de) n Greek: ηρωίνη (el) f (iroḯni) Hindi: हेरोइन (heroin) Hungarian: heroin (hu) Icelandic: heróín n Ido: heroeno (io) Irish: héaróin Italian: eroina (it) Japanese: ヘロイン (ja) (heroin) Khmer: ហេរ៉ូអ៊ីន (heerouʼiin) Korean: 헤로인 (heroin) Latin: heroinum Latvian: heroīns Lithuanian: heroinas Macedonian: херои́н m (heroín) Norwegian: heroin m Persian: هروئین‎ (fa) Polish: heroina (pl) f Portuguese: heroína (pt) f, cavalo (pt) m (slang) Romanian: heroină (ro) f Russian: герои́н (ru) m (geroín) Serbo-Croatian: Cyrillic: херо̀ӣн m Roman: heròīn (sh) m Spanish: heroína (es) f Swahili: heroini Swedish: heroin (sv) n Thai: เฮโรอีน (th) (hay-roh-een) Turkish: eroin (tr) Urdu: ہیروئین‎ (heroīn) Vietnamese: bạch phiến Welsh: heroin

References

1. Marcus Aurin (September 2000), “Chasing the Dragon: The Cultural Metamorphosis of Opium in the United States, 1825-1935”, in Medical Anthropology Quarterly, volume 14, issue 3, DOI:10.1525/maq.2000.14.3.414, pages 414-441

Further reading

• heroin on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• Horine, hieron, on hire

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Czech

Noun

heroin m

1. heroin

Synonyms

• herák

Further reading

• heroin in Kartotéka Novočeského lexikálního archivu
• heroin in Slovník spisovného jazyka českého, 1960–1971, 1989

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Danish

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -in

Noun

heroin c or n (singular definite heroinen or heroinet, uncountable)

1. heroin

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Finnish

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -eroin

Noun

heroin

1. instructive plural of hera

Anagrams

• hieron

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Japanese

Romanization

heroin

1. Rōmaji transcription of ヘロイン

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Serbo-Croatian

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /xerǒiːn/
• Hyphenation: he‧ro‧in

Noun

heròīn m (Cyrillic spelling херо̀ӣн)

1. heroin

Declension

Declension of heroin

	singular
nominative	heròīn
genitive	heroína
dative	heroinu
accusative	heroin
vocative	heroine
locative	heroinu
instrumental	heroinom

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Swedish

Etymology

From German Heroin.

Noun

heroin n

1. heroin

Declension

Declension of heroin
	Uncountable
	Indefinite	Definite
Nominative	heroin	heroinet	—	—
Genitive	heroins	heroinets	—	—