<P> "Hair of the dog", short for "Hair of the dog that bit you", is a colloquial expression in the English language predominantly used to refer to alcohol that is consumed with the aim of lessening the effects of a hangover . </P> <P> The expression originally referred to a method of treatment of a rabid dog bite by placing hair from the dog in the bite wound . Ebenezer Cobham Brewer writes in the Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (1898): "In Scotland it is a popular belief that a few hairs of the dog that bit you applied to the wound will prevent evil consequences . Applied to drinks, it means, if overnight you have indulged too freely, take a glass of the same wine within 24 hours to soothe the nerves .' If this dog do you bite, soon as out of your bed, take a hair of the tail the next day ."' He also cites two apocryphal poems containing the phrase, one of which is attributed to Aristophanes . It is possible that the phrase was used to justify an existing practice, and the idea of Latin: similia similibus curantur ("like cures like") dates back at least to the time of Hippocrates and exists today as the basic postulate of classical homeopathy . In the 1930s cocktails known as Corpse Revivers were served in hotels . </P> <P> The earliest known reference to the phrase "hair of the dog" in connection with drunkenness is found in a text from ancient Ugarit dating from the mid to late second millennium BC, in which the god ʾIlu becomes hungover after a drinking binge . The text includes a recipe for a salve to be applied to the god's forehead, which consists of "hairs of a dog" and parts of an unknown plant mixed with olive oil . </P>

Where does hair of the dog come from