Vol. 09 · Loanwords ·South Asia ·1590s
Curry
from kaṟi
- Meaning
- A dish of meat or vegetables in a spiced sauce.
- Source word
- kaṟi
- Route into English
- Tamil *kaṟi* (a sauce or relish eaten with rice) → English via Portuguese traders in the 16th century. The term in South India meant a specific kind of relish; English broadened it into a whole cuisine.
- Arrived
- 1590s
From South Asia
Three centuries of British colonial contact — East India Company, Raj, military, domestic life — deposited a distinct Hindi/Urdu/Bengali/Sanskrit layer in everyday English.
English borrows.
Browse the full loanword atlas or explore another source language.