utu
utu noun: compensation for a wrong suffered; reciprocal exchange or payment; (loosely), payback, revenge.
Noun
utu (uncountable)
- Compensation for a wrong suffered; reciprocal exchange or payment; (loosely), payback, revenge.
- Utu determined that relations among individuals, and between families, communities and tribes, were governed by mutual obligation and an implicit keeping of social accounts […].2003, Michael King, The Penguin History of Aotearoa New Zealand, Penguin, published 2023, page 68
- Utu demanded that both favors and grievances be repaid in kind, but it was the grievances, naturally, that caused the most trouble.2008, Christina Thompson, Come on Shore and We Will Kill and Eat You All, Bloomsbury, published 2009, page 129
Proper noun (1) capitalized: UTU
UTU
- Initialism of Ulster Teachers' Union.
- Initialism of United Transportation Union.
- Initialism of University of Turku.
Proper noun (2) capitalized: Utu
Utu
- A Sumerian deity, the son of the moon god Nanna and the goddess Ningal.
Origin of utu
Borrowed from Māori utu.
From Sumerian 𒀭𒌓 (ᵈutu, “Utu”).
Phrases with utu
Questions about utu
- What does utu mean?
- Utu means compensation for a wrong suffered; reciprocal exchange or payment; (loosely), payback, revenge.
- What part of speech is utu?
- Utu can be a noun or a proper noun.
Words near utu in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: utu (page history and authors); UTU (page history and authors); Utu (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Cite this entry: “utu.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/utu. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.