# Venomous vs. poisonous: A history? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 28, 2015, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/venomous-vs-poisonous-a-history/721055 "2015-05-28T17:34:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 7
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [May 29, 2015, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/venomous-vs-poisonous-a-history/721055/7 "2015-05-29T01:32:47Z")
> [@RealityChuck](#): > > Is there a change? According to the [Ngram viewer](https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=venomous+snake%2Cpoisonous+snake&year_start=1800&year_end=2000&corpus=15&smoothing=3&share=&search_plus_one=form&direct_url=t1%3B%2Cvenomous%20snake%3B%2Cc0%3B.t1%3B%2Cpoisonous%20snake%3B%2Cc0), “poisonous snake” is used far more than “venomous snake,” and the graphs run in parallel. They seem to have been used with almost equal frequency until about 1880, when poisonous snake began to be preferred. Interestingly, this is the opposite of the change one would expect if people were starting to apply the nitpicking definition. They begin to run in parallel after 1940. > [@Crotalus](#): > > When I worked in a venom lab in the 1970s, we used the words interchangably in conversation, but we did refer to our company as a venom lab, not a poison lab. I never ran into nitpickery on this topic until I started reading SDMB, and it makes me roll my eyes every time I see it. When I took herpetology in 1972, I don’t ever recall a distinction being made. I’ve only heard this supposed distinction within the past decade or so. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/venomous-vs-poisonous-a-history/721055)._