eyedrop

• eye-drop, eye drop

eye +‎ drop. Compare West Frisian eachdrip (“tear”, literally “eyedrop”), Dutch oogdrup (“tear”, literally “eyedrop”). Compare also German Augentropfen (“eyedrops”).

eyedrop (plural eyedrops)

1. (medicine) Medicine to be administered to the eyes.
2. (poetic) A tear.
   • c. 1596–1599, William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358, [Act IV, scene v], line 88:

     My lord, I found the prince in the next room, / Washing with kindly tears his gentle cheeks, / With such a deep demeanour in great sorrow / That tyranny, which never quaff'd but blood, / Would, by beholding him, have wash'd his knife / With gentle eye-drops. He is coming hither.

• drop

• eyedrop on Wikipedia.Wikipedia