purgative

Estimated CEFR level: C2 — Proficiency

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

From Middle French purgatif.

The water is tolerably good, but a little purgative. — Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846, James Richardson
I know of nothing more purgative of winter fumes and indigestions. — Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience, Henry David Thoreau
But worst of all is nausea, or a pain About the lower region of the bowels; Love, who heroically breathes a vein, Shrinks from the application of hot towels, And purgatives are dangerous to his reign, Sea-sickness death: his love was perfect, how else Could Juan’s passion, while the billows roar, Resist his stomach, ne’er at sea before? — Don Juan, George Gordon Byron, Baron Byron

cathartic, physic, aperient

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