Alexipharmacum

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A medical preparation designed to counteract poisons and toxins in the body
2. A therapeutic agent that neutralizes the effects of harmful substances and poisons
3. A substance made to neutralize or cancel the harmful effects of toxins and poisons

Etymology: The Greek word "alexiphármakon" is built from two parts: "alexein," meaning "to ward off" or "to keep away," and "phármakon," a word that meant both "drug" and "poison." The second half is the more striking one. In Greek, a single term could name a healing remedy and a deadly substance, because the same preparation could cure in one dose and kill in another. An "alexiphármakon" was therefore a drug whose job was to push back against a poison that had already been taken. The word passed into Latin as "alexipharmacum," keeping the same sense of a counter-poison. English borrowed it directly from that Latin form, and it has stayed a learned, specialist term ever since, reserved for antidotes in medical and historical writing rather than everyday speech.