Etymology

Kuru disease

Today it means: A rare, fatal prion disease of the Fore people of Papua New Guinea, causing progressive neurological decline and historically transmitted through mortuary endocannibalism. Full definition →

for kúru
Ask AI about its historyChatGPTClaudePerplexityGoogle AIGrok

The story

  1. for · borrowed fromkúru
  2. English todayKuru disease

From Fore kúru (literally “trembling, shivering”). Perhaps eventually from Proto-Gorokan *kút(V) (“dangling, shaking”) if cognate with the reduplicated element of Yagaria gúli gúli hu- (“be loose, rattle”).

Words from the same roots

forkúru all →

kuru

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.