dry – English adjective declension

Adjective: dry

Comparison Forms

Synthetic

Comparative	drier; dryer
Superlative	driest; dryest

Perifrastic

Sample Sentences

This towel's dry. Could you wet it and cover the chicken so it doesn't go dry as it cooks?
The weather, […] we […] both agreed, was too dry for the season. [2026 September 6 (Gregorian calendar), Joseph Addison, “The Free-holder: No. 22. Sunday, March 5. [1716.]”, in The Works of the Right Honourable Joseph Addison, Esq; […], volume IV, London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], published 1721, →OCLC:]
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. [1850, Harper's Magazine, volume 1, page 449:]
Not a dry eye was to be seen in the assembly. [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:]
The project poses exceptional challenges, given that Antarctica is the coldest, windiest and driest continent on Earth, as well as the most remote and inaccessible, being almost totally covered by a vast ice sheet. [2019 September 26, Gianluca Mezzofiore, “Wanted: A design team for a building project at Earth’s most remote location – Antarctica”, in CNN:]
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. […] Experts say the smallest towns are especially vulnerable. And few places in Utah are as tiny or dry as Echo, a jumble of homes squeezed between a freight railroad and stunning red-rock cliffs. [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, →ISSN, archived from the original on 31 Jul 2021:]
This well is as dry as that cow.
[A]lready the gate was blocked with a wall of squared stones laid dry, but very thick and very high, across the opening. [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:]
Dry alcohol is 200 proof.
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. [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]:]
Of course it's a dry house. He was an alcoholic but he's been dry for almost a year now.
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[…] [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]:]
You'll have to drive out of this dry county to find any liquor.
These epistles will become less dry, more susceptible of ornament. [1733, [Alexander Pope], An Essay on Man. […], (please specify |epistle=I to IV), London: […] J[ohn] Wilford, […], →OCLC:]
Proper martinis are made with London dry gin and dry vermouth.
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. [1983, Lorenzo Semple Jr., Never Say Never Again:]
Steven Wright has a deadpan delivery, Norm Macdonald has a dry sense of humor, and Oscar Wilde had a dry wit.
a dry academic discipline turned into a living subject
A dry lecture may require the professor to bring a water gun in order to keep the students' attention.
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 […] [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]:]
Mr. Evans naturally does not see things in a dry light. He has the dramatic instinct, and impresses it on all he touches. [1907, Ronald M. Burrows, The Discoveries In Crete, page 2:]
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. [2012, Winston S. Churchill, Martin Gilbert, Churchill: The Power of Words, page 14:]
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!.
This fighter jet's engine has a maximum dry thrust of 200 kilonewtons.
never dry fire a bow
dry humping her girlfriend
making a dry run
dry snitches are as bad as regular snitches
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. [1958, Gordon Grimley, The Book of the Bow, page 167:]
[…] most like "dry firing," or a dry release, wherein the string meets no resistance. [1992, Pennsylvania Game News, volume 63, page 57:]
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, […] [1992, Dwight R. Schuh, Bowhunter's Encyclopedia, Stackpole Books, →ISBN, page 81:]
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 […] [2015, Naoko Takei Moore, Kyle Connaughton, Donabe: Classic and Modern Japanese Clay Pot Cooking, Ten Speed Press, →ISBN, page 8:]
dry bite
Things are dry right now. We're hoping business'll pick up next month.
Fa la la la
Fa la la lee
Now let me go, my honey oh
back to Tennessee
It's beefsteak when I'm workin,
whiskey when I'm dry, and
sweet heaven when I die [2011, Gillian Welch, “Tennessee”, in The Harrow & the Harvest, performed by Gillian Welch and David Rawlings:]
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. [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:]

Adjectives inflected like dry

love-shy, dry, fly, wry, sly, ultradry,

Etymology

1. 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”).
2. cognates and related terms
3. Cognate with Scots dry, drey (“dry”), North Frisian drüg, driig, Saterland Frisian druuch (“dry”), West Frisian droech (“dry”), Dutch droog (“dry”), Low German dröög (“dry”), German dröge (“dull”), Icelandic draugur (“a dry log”). Related also to German trocken (“dry”), West Frisian drege (“long-lasting”), Danish drøj (“tough”), Swedish dryg (“lasting, hard”), Icelandic drjúgur (“ample, long”), Latin firmus (“strong, firm, stable, durable”). See also drought, drain, dree. See: Dutch Adjectives 'droog', German Adjectives 'dröge', German Adjectives 'trocken', Swedish Adjectives 'dryg', Latin Adjectives 'firmus'.

Verbs referencing "dry"

German Adjectives treuge.