woorali, wourali
(wuːˈrɑːliː)
Also 8–9 woorara, 9 woorrara, wooraly. See also oorali, urali, urari.
[See curare.]
A South American climbing plant, Strychnos toxifera, from the root of which one of the ingredients of the poison curare is obtained; also, the poison itself. Also attrib., as woorali poison, woorali vine.
| [1596 L. Keymis Relat. Second Voy. Guiana G 2, Names of poysoned hearbes. Ourari.] 1769 E. Bancroft Ess. Nat. Hist. Guiana 101 The Woorara, which is the principal ingredient in the composition of the fatal Indian arrow poison of that name. 1796 Stedman Surinam I. xv. 395 A few of the above arrows are frequently dipped in the woorara poison, which is instantaneously fatal. 1803 Winterbottom Sierra Leone I. xv. 271 A kind of dart,..dipped in a poison called woorrara. 1825 Waterton Wand. S. Amer. 53 A vine grows in these wilds, which is called wourali. Ibid., The wourali poison destroys life's action so gently, that the victim appears to be in no pain whatever. Ibid. 54 He scrapes the wourali vine and bitter root into thin shavings. 1842 Penny Cycl. XXIII. 152/2 Wooraly, Urari, or Poison-plant of Guiana. 1862 N. Syd. Soc. Year-bk. Med. 18 Nervous sensibility, after its suspension by woorara poisoning. 1902 P. Fountain Mts. & For. S. Amer. vii. 185 My mixture..was, like the true wourali, innocuous if swallowed. Ibid. 189, I have..strong grounds for believing that it is snake-poison that is the active principle in the wourali paste. |