hair of the dog that bit you

Cultural  

1. A remedy that contains a small amount of whatever caused the ailment: “When Anne had a bad hangover, Paul offered her a Bloody Mary and said, ‘Have a little of the hair of the dog that bit you.’”

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hair of the dog that bit you Idioms  

1. Whatever made you ill used as a remedy, especially alcohol as a hangover cure. For example, A little hair of the dog will cure that hangover in no time. This expression, already a proverb in John Heywood's 1546 compendium, is based on the ancient folk treatment for dogbite of putting a burnt hair of the dog on the wound. It is often shortened, as in the example.

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Example Sentences

But the most common remedy has always been figurative: to pluck a hair of the dog that bit you.

From Slate

An 1889 dictionary of American slang defines a “corpse reviver” as a dram of spirits, tying into the old notion that a bit of alcohol, “the hair of the dog that bit you,” would help alleviate the effects of a hangover.

From Washington Post

"Well, as you are determined to pup—punish me," says he, "here is another glass of Tommie's claret, another hair of the dog that bit you, to confirm you in that meritorious resolve."

From Project Gutenberg

When drunks treat hangovers in the same manner, it is known as taking the hair of the dog that bit you.

From Time Magazine Archive

A hair of the dog that bit you is recommended as a cure for the consequences of drunkenness; but when intoxication results in beating women, the dog does not afford so proper a remedy as the cat.

From Project Gutenberg