drudge

English

From Middle English druggen, perhaps from Old English *dryċġan,^[1] from Proto-West Germanic *druggjan, from Proto-Germanic *drugjaną, a denominative built to a lost noun *drugjaz (preserved in Old English Dryċġhelm), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰrewgʰ-; compare Old English drēogan (“to do; to suffer”).^[2]

drudge (plural drudges)

A person who works in a low servile job.
drudge work
(derogatory) Someone who works for (and may be taken advantage of by) someone else.

person who works in a low job

person who works for someone else

drudge (third-person singular simple present drudges, present participle drudging, simple past and past participle drudged)

(intransitive) To labour in (or as in) a low servile job.
- 1682, Thomas Otway, Venice Preserv'd:
  Rise to our Toils and drudge away the day.
- 1856 February, [Thomas Babington] Macaulay, “Oliver Goldsmith”, in T[homas] F[lower] E[llis], editor, The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, new edition, London: Longman, Green, Reader, & Dyer, published 1871, →OCLC:
  He gradually rose in the estimation of the booksellers for whom he drudged.

to labour as in a low servile job

^ Barnhart, Robert and Steinmetz, Sol, editors (1988), “drudge”, in The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology‎^[1], Bronxville, N.Y.: The H. W. Wilson Co., →ISBN, →OCLC, page 303, column 2.
^ Douglas Harper (2001–2025), “drudge”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.