"C" Word Origins

curative

Latin

From Medieval Latin curativus, from Latin curare 'to care for, to attend to, to heal', from cura 'care'.

curator

Latin

From Latin curator, "one who takes care of something," from curare, "to take care of."

curb

Latin

From Middle French courbe, "curved object," from Latin curvus, "bent, curved" — making it a doublet of "curve."

curcumin

Origin

From translingual Curcuma, from Arabic كُرْكُم (kurkum, “turmeric”) + -in.

curd

Middle English

From Middle English curd, an altered form of "crud" — both ultimately mean a coagulated substance.

curdle

Origin

Metathesis of earlier dialectal cruddle, crudle, equivalent to curd + -le (frequentative suffix).

cure

Latin

From Old French cure, "care, healing," from Latin cura, "care, medical attention" — the same root behind "curator" and "manicure."

curfew

Old French

From Old French cuevre-fu, literally "cover fire" — originally an evening signal for households to bank their hearth fires for the night.

curia

Latin

Borrowed directly from Latin curia.

curial

Origin

Borrowed from Middle French curial, from Latin cūriālis.

curiate

Origin

From Latin cūriātus, see -ate (adjective-forming suffix).

curie

Origin · 1859

Named after physicist Pierre Curie (1859–1906), who along with his wife Marie Curie pioneered research into radioactivity.

curing

Origin

See the etymology of the corresponding lemma form.

curio

Origin

Clipping of curiosity, 1851. Compare cabinet of curiosities and French objet de curiosité.

curiosity

Latin

From Latin curiositas, from curiosus, "careful, inquisitive" — related to cura, "care."

curious

Latin

From Latin curiosus, "careful, inquisitive," from cura, "care" — the same root that gives us "curator" and "curious."

curiously

Middle English

From Middle English curiusly, built from "curious" plus "-ly."

curl

Middle English

From an older Middle English word meaning "curled" or "curly," likely related to a Middle Dutch word for "curl."

Curley

Origin

A shortened form of the surname McCurley.

curlicue

Origin

From curly + cue.

curly

Origin

From "curl" plus the adjective-forming suffix "-y."

Curran

Irish

An anglicized form of the Irish name Ó Corraidhín, from a word related to "spear."

currant

Origin

Borrowed from French raisin de Corinthe (literally “grapes of Corinth, the city in Greece”). Cognate with Dutch krent. Doublet of Corinth.

currency

Medieval Latin

From Medieval Latin currentia, "a flowing" or "a running," from Latin currere, "to run" — the idea of money "running" or circulating through an economy.

current

Latin

From Old French curant, present participle of courre, "to run," from Latin currere, "to run" — the same root as "currency" and "courier."

currently

Origin

From "current" plus the adverb-forming suffix "-ly."

curriculum

Latin

From Latin curriculum, "a course" (literally a running or race course), from currere, "to run" — the same root as "current" and "courier."

curry

French · 1300

The food sense comes from Tamil kaṟi via French, first appearing in English cookbooks in the 1300s-1700s. The "curry favor" sense comes from an unrelated Middle English word meaning to groom or dress down a horse.

curse

Old English

From Old English curs, of unknown origin — one of the few common English words with no clear ancestor further back.

cursed

Origin

The past participle of curse, formed with the ending -ed.

cursing

Old English

From Old English cursung, the noun form of curse.

cursive

Origin

Borrowed from Middle French cursif, from Medieval Latin cursīvus, from Latin cursus.

cursor

Origin

Borrowed from Latin cursor (“runner”), from currō (“run”) + -or (agentive suffix). Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European.

cursory

Latin

From Latin cursorius, "hasty, of running," from currere, "to run" — the same root as "curriculum" and "current."

curt

Latin

From Latin curtus, "shortened" — the same root gives us "curtail" and, through French, "short" as a doublet.

curtail

Latin

From curtal, an obsolete word for a horse with a docked tail, reshaped under the influence of Latin curtus 'shortened, cut short'.

curtain

Late Latin

From Old French cortine, from Late Latin cortina, "curtain" — itself a loan-translation of a Greek word.

curtilage

Origin

Inherited from Middle English courtelage, curtilage, curtylage (“vegetable garden; croft; gardening, farming”), from Anglo-Norman curtilage, from Old French cortillage, courtillage (modern French courtillage (obsolete); compare Medieval Latin cortilagium, curtilagium), from cortil, cortill (“small court, garth”) + -age (suffix denoting a relationship with a place). Cortil, cortill are derived from cort, curt (“court of a monarch”) + -il (suffix forming place names); and cort, curt from Latin cōrtem, the accusative singular form of cōrs, a variant of cohors (“court; enclosure; farmyard; etc.”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ḱóm (“beside, by; near; with”) + *ǵʰer- (“to enclose”).

Curtis

Old French

From Old French corteis/curteis, meaning "courteous" — a doublet of the modern word courteous.

curvaceous

Origin

From curv(e) + -aceous. Originally American English. First attested in the 1930s.

curvature

Latin

From Latin curvatura, from curvare, "to bend" — related to curve.

curve

Latin

From Latin curvus, "bent," tracing back to a very old root meaning "to bend or turn" that also gave English "curb" and "cancer" (via the curled shape of a crab).

curveball

Origin

From curve + ball, describing a pitch that curves in flight.

curvet

Origin

From Italian corvetta, diminutive of corva, an early form of curva (“curve”), from Latin curva, feminine of curvus (“bent, curved”).

curvy

Origin

From curve + the adjective-forming suffix -y.

cushion

Vulgar Latin

From Old French coissin, from Vulgar Latin coxinus, "seat pad," ultimately from Latin coxa, "hip."

cushy

Origin

Borrowed from Hindustani khushi, "happiness," picked up by British soldiers in India.

cusp

Latin

From Latin cuspis, "a point, a spear tip" — first borrowed into English through astrology, to describe the boundary between star signs.