slug

• enPR: slŭg, IPA^(key): /slʌɡ/

• Audio (US)

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• Audio (AU)

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• Rhymes: -ʌɡ

The Spanish slug (Arion vulgaris)

Originally referred to a slow, lazy person, from Middle English slugge (“lazy person", also "slowth, slothfulness”), probably of either Old English or Old Norse origin; compare Norn slug (“lazy, slothful, sluggish”), dialectal Norwegian slugg (“a large, heavy body”), sluggje (“heavy, slow person”), Danish slog (“rascal, rogue”); perhaps ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *sliǵ-ōn, from *sley- (“smooth; slick; sticky; slimy”)[1] or otherwise from the root of Old Norse slókr (“lazy person, oaf”), whence Icelandic slókur (“laziness”). Compare also Dutch slak (“snail, slug”). Doublet of slotch.

slug (plural slugs)

1. Any of many terrestrial pulmonate gastropod mollusks, having no (or only a rudimentary) shell. [from early 18^th c.]
2. (obsolete) A slow, lazy person; a sluggard. [from early 15^th c.]
3. A bullet or other projectile fired from a firearm; in modern usage, generally refers to a shotgun slug. [from 1620s]
   • 1743, Robert Drury, The Pleasant, and Surprizing Adventures of Mr. Robert Drury, during his Fifteen Years Captivity on the Island of Madagascar‎, London, page 55:

     […] all our Ammunition was spent. Those of us who had Money made Slugs of it; their next Shift was to take the middle Screws out of their Guns, and charge their Pieces with them.

   • 2008, BioWare, Mass Effect, Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: Mass Accelerators Codex entry:

     A mass accelerator propels a solid metal slug using precisely-controlled electromagnetic attraction and repulsion. The slug is designed to squash or shatter on impact, increasing the energy it transfers to the target. If this were not the case, it would simply punch a hole right through, doing minimal damage.

4. A solid block or piece of roughly shaped metal.
5. A counterfeit coin, especially one used to steal from vending machines. [from 1880s]
6. A shot of a drink, usually alcoholic. [from 1750s]
7. (journalism) A title, name or header, a catchline, a short phrase or title to indicate the content of a newspaper or magazine story for editing use. [from 1920s]
8. (physics, rare) The imperial (English) unit of mass that accelerates by 1 foot per second squared (1 ft/s²) when a force of one pound-force (lbf) is exerted on it.

   Synonym: geepound

   The average slug has a mass of around 0.00002 slugs.

9. A discrete mass of a material that moves as a unit, usually through another material.
   • 1969, Graham B. Wallis, One-Dimensional Two-Phase Flow, McGraw-Hill, section 10.2, pages 282–283:

     This is perhaps best done by considering a unit cell consisting of one bubble and part of the liquid slugs on each side of it…

   • 1973, Pulp & Paper International, volume 15:

     When these layers are recovered they inevitably result in a slug of sawdust which goes into the digester and tends to plug the screens in a Kamyr digester.

   • 1987, United States. Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, United States. Board of Mine Operations Appeals, Occupational safety and health decisions:

     Then, just a few nights before August 6, Gilbert testified that a "slug of sand-rock" weighing an estimate of one to two tons fell on his continuous miner as he was taking a cut, approximately fifteen feet from where he was standing.

   • 1998, Orrin H. Pilkey with Katharine L. Dixon, The Corps and the Shore, page 159:

     Tvpically, enough sand is emplaced to create a slug of sand that moves along the shore causing noticeable and somewhat dramatic local changes.

   • 1998, N. A. Krylov with A. A. Bokserman and Evgeniĭ Romanovich Stavrovskiĭ, The oil industry of the former Soviet Union, page 112:

     This is also furthered by the creation of a slug of light hydrocarbons near the oil displacement front, extracted by the carbon dioxide from the oil

   • 2005, Sam Mannan with Frank P. Lees, Lee's loss prevention in the process industries, page 16-115:

     Another phenomenon investigated was a slug of water falling through the cloud.

   • 2007, William Lauer with Fred Sanchez, Disinfection of pipelines and storage facilities field guide, page 54:

     This method uses a slug of 100 mg/L chlorinated water as a slug that moves along the length of the pipeline. The slug is a percentage of the total length of the pipeline.

   • 2010, Nancy E. McTigue, James M. Symons, editors, The water dictionary: a comprehensive reference of water terminology‎, 2nd edition, American Water Works Association, page 556:

     For example, a slug of iron rust might appear because of the shearing action of a high-demand flow that loosens a previously deposited iron precipitate.

   • 2010, Robert A. Meyers, Extreme Environmental Events, page 1198:

     These experiments investigate the ascent of a slug of gas in a vertical liquid-filed tube featuring a flare that abruptly doubles the cross sectional area.

   • 2011, Bill Calfee, The Art of Rimfire Accuracy, page 125:

     You had to learn to grab the teat up next to the udder with your thumb and side of your first finger, grab a slug of milk and progressively squeeze it down the teat past your middle finger, ring finger and little finger

10. A motile pseudoplasmodium formed by amoebae working together.
11. (rail transport) An accessory to a diesel-electric locomotive, used to increase adhesive weight and allow full power to be applied at a lower speed. It has trucks with traction motors, but lacks a prime mover, being powered by electricity from the mother locomotive, and may or may not have a control cab.
12. (television editing) A black screen.
13. (letterpress typography) A piece of type metal imprinted by a linotype machine; also a black mark placed in the margin to indicate an error; also said in application to typewriters; type slug.
14. (regional) A stranger picked up as a passenger to enable legal use of high occupancy vehicle lanes.
15. (US, slang, District of Columbia) A hitchhiking commuter.
16. (web development, SEO) The last part of a clean URL, the displayed resource name, similar to a filename.
    • 2016, Fabian Vogelsteller, Isaac Strack, Marcelo Reyna, Meteor: Full-Stack Web Application Development, Packt Publishing Ltd, →ISBN, page 71:

      Slugs are better than just appending the document ID to the URL, as they are readable and understandable by visitors. They are also an important part of a good SEO. So that we can use slugs, every slug has to be unique.

17. (obsolete) A hindrance, an obstruction.
    • 1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Usury”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret, →OCLC:

      money would be stirring, if it were not for this slug

18. A ship that sails slowly.
    • 1666, Samuel Pepys, Diary entry 17 October 1666:

      His rendezvous for his fleet, and for all sluggs to come to, should be between Calais and Dover.

• (small amount of liquor): see nip & Thesaurus:drink

• lug
• sluggard

• (gastropod, locomotive): snail

slug (third-person singular simple present slugs, present participle slugging, simple past and past participle slugged)

1. To drink quickly; to gulp; to down.
2. To take part in casual carpooling; to form ad hoc, informal carpools for commuting, essentially a variation of ride-share commuting and hitchhiking.
   • 1998 July 23, “Ramsey Vows to Find New Sites for Commuter `Slug Lines'”, in Washington Post:

     "We believe in car-pooling, but let's do it without restricting traffic. ..." Sam Snyder, 51, of Burke, who has been slugging to his job at the US Customs ....

   • 2002 December 13, Joshua E. Rodd, “The Perfect Mass Transit”, in dc.urban-planning (Usenet), message-ID <FmpK9.110446$%p6.11081387@twister.neo.rr.com>:

     no sane person would attempt to commute that far every day. Sure they do. I've often slugged to Fredericksburg and back. The VRE carries hundreds of people per day, and the I-95 HOV lanes carry tens of thousands of people each day.

3. (intransitive, of a bullet) To become reduced in diameter, or changed in shape, by passing from a larger to a smaller part of the bore of the barrel.
4. (obsolete, intransitive) To move slowly or sluggishly; to lie idle.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book II, Canto I”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 23:

     To slug in slouth and sensuall delights.

5. (transitive) To load with a slug or slugs.

   to slug a gun

6. To make sluggish.
   • 1692, John Milton, translated by [Joseph Washington], A Defence of the People of England, […]: In Answer to Salmasius’s Defence of the King, [London?: s.n.], →OCLC:

     So little do we fear , you slug you

• slugabed

Uncertain. Perhaps somehow from Proto-Germanic *slagiz (“a blow, strike”). If so, then ultimately cognate with German Schlag (“blow, hit”) and Dutch slag (“blow, strike”).

slug (plural slugs)

1. A hard blow, usually with the fist. [from 1830s]

slug (third-person singular simple present slugs, present participle slugging, simple past and past participle slugged)

1. (transitive) To hit very hard, usually with the fist.

   He insulted my mother, so I slugged him.

   The fighter slugged his opponent into unconsciousness.

   • 1983, Frank Lupo, Stephen J. Cannell, “Mexican Slayride”, in The A-Team, season 1, episode 1, spoken by Zack (Ron Palillo):

     The man is a mechanical genius. He also has one of the worst conduct records in the army. He likes to slug officers.

   • 2015 August 11, Jocelyn Samara D., Rain (webcomic), Comic 713 - I'm Done:

     "Urgh... I know you wanted to have another day at the con, but if I had to listen to her speak anymore, I was going to do something I'd regret. Honestly, you probably should've slugged her." "Believe me. I wanted to."

• slug away
• slugfest
• slugging match
• slug it out
• slugger

• Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “slug”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

• Guls, LUGs, lugs

Cognate with Irish slog.

slug (verbal noun sluggey, past participle sluggit)

1. to swallow, swig, slug, guzzle, draw
2. to devour, gorge, gulp
3. to engulf

slug m (genitive singular slug, plural sluggyn)

1. swallow, swig, draught

• sluggag

Borrowed from Middle Low German slû, probably from a Proto-Germanic *slūhaz (“sneaking, creeping”), perhaps ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *(s)leuǵ (“to crawl, slide”), if the original sense referred to sneaking and sliding.[1] Cognate of German schlau, Dutch sluw.

• Rhymes: -ʉːɡ

slug

1. sly, cunning

The difference between listig and slug is similar to the difference between cunning and sly, where slug sounds more deceitful by default.

• bakslug
• knipslug
• slughet
• småslug

• listig

• slug in Svensk ordbok (SO)
• slug in Svenska Akademiens ordlista (SAOL)
• slug in Svenska Akademiens ordbok (SAOB)

Borrowed from Irish slog (“to swallow”), form Old Irish sluicid, from Proto-Celtic *slunketi.

• IPA^(key): /slʊɡ/

slug

1. to eat greedily

• slougherdhès

• Jacob Poole (d. 1827) (before 1828) William Barnes, editor, A Glossary, With some Pieces of Verse, of the old Dialect of the English Colony in the Baronies of Forth and Bargy, County of Wexford, Ireland, London: J. Russell Smith, published 1867, page 68