Old English hungor "unease or pain caused by lack of food, craving appetite, debility from lack of food," from Proto-Germanic *hungruz (cognates: Old Frisian hunger, Old Saxon hungar, Old High German hungar, Old Norse hungr, German hunger, Dutch honger, Gothic huhrus), probably from PIE root *kenk- (2) "to suffer hunger or thirst." Hunger strike attested from 1885; earliest references are to prisoners in Russia.

Old English hyngran (cognates: Old Saxon gihungrjan, Old High German hungaran, German hungern, Gothic huggrjan), from the source of hunger, n.. Related: Hungered; hungering.