/ ˈkɜːfjuː; NAmE ˈkɜːrf-/ noun [ C , U ]
1.
a law which says that people must not go outside after a particular time at night until the morning; the time after which nobody must go outside :
The army imposed a dusk-to-dawn curfew.
You must get home before curfew.
2.
( NAmE ) a time when children must be home in the evening :
I have a 10 o'clock curfew.
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WORD ORIGIN
Middle English (denoting a regulation requiring people to extinguish fires at a fixed hour in the evening, or a bell rung at that hour): from Old French cuevrefeu , from cuvrir to cover + feu fire. The current sense dates from the late 19th cent.