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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

curry.

One of a family of dishes originating from Indian cuisine, flavored by a spiced sauce.

5 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈkʌ.ɹi/Received-Pronunciation, US/kɝ.i//ˈkʊ.ɹi/Northern-England/ˈkari/South-Asia
  1. One of a family of dishes originating from Indian cuisine, flavored by a spiced sauce.

    countable · uncountable
    beef curry
    vegetarian curry
  2. A spiced sauce or relish, especially one flavored with curry powder.

    countable · uncountable
  3. Curry powder.

    countable · uncountable
  4. A person of South Asian heritage.

    countable · derogatory · ethnic · slur · uncountable
Where this word comes from

1747 (as currey, first published recipe for the dish in English), from Tamil கறி (kaṟi), influenced by existing Middle English cury (“cooking”), from Middle French cuyre (“to cook”) (whence also cuisine), from Vulgar Latin cocere, from Latin coquere. Earlier cury found in 1390 cookbook Forme of Cury (Forms of Cooking) by court chefs of Richard II of England.

verb/ˈkʌ.ɹi/Received-Pronunciation, US/kɝ.i//ˈkʊ.ɹi/Northern-England/ˈkari/South-Asia
  1. To cook or season with curry powder.

    transitive
Where this word comes from

1747 (as currey, first published recipe for the dish in English), from Tamil கறி (kaṟi), influenced by existing Middle English cury (“cooking”), from Middle French cuyre (“to cook”) (whence also cuisine), from Vulgar Latin cocere, from Latin coquere. Earlier cury found in 1390 cookbook Forme of Cury (Forms of Cooking) by court chefs of Richard II of England.

verb/ˈkʌ.ɹi/Received-Pronunciation, US/kɝ.i//ˈkʊ.ɹi/Northern-England/ˈkari/South-Asia
  1. To groom (a horse); to dress or rub down a horse with a curry comb.

    transitive
  2. To dress (leather) after it is tanned by beating, rubbing, scraping and colouring.

    transitive
  3. To beat, thrash; to drub.

    transitive
  4. To try to win or gain (favour) by flattering.

    figuratively · transitive
Where this word comes from

From Middle English currayen, from Old French correer (“to prepare”), presumably from Vulgar Latin *conredare, from Latin com- (a form of con- (“with; together”)) + a verb derived from Proto-Germanic *raidaz. More at ready.

verb/ˈkʌ.ɹi/Received-Pronunciation, US/kɝ.i//ˈkʊ.ɹi/Northern-England/ˈkari/South-Asia
  1. To perform currying upon.

    transitive
Where this word comes from

Named after American mathematician Haskell Curry.

verb/ˈkʌ.ɹi/Received-Pronunciation, US/kɝ.i//ˈkʊ.ɹi/Northern-England/ˈkari/South-Asia
  1. To scurry; to ride or run hastily

    intransitive · obsolete
  2. To cover (a distance); (of a projectile) to traverse (its range).

    obsolete · transitive
  3. To hurry.

    obsolete · transitive
Where this word comes from

Possibly derived from currier, a common 16th- to 18th-century form of courier, as if to ride post, to post. Possibly influenced by scurry.

noun/ˈkʌ.ɹi/Received-Pronunciation, US/kɝ.i//ˈkʊ.ɹi/Northern-England/ˈkari/South-Asia
  1. Obsolete form of quarry.

    alt-of · obsolete
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.