puna

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   altitude sickness experienced on the high Andes, marked by symptoms such as breathlessness, headache, or nausea

   The arriero called the traveler's shortness of breath puna and advised a slower ascent.

2. 2
   noun

   a high, cold, dry plateau or alpine grassland of the central Andes

   Coarse grasses and low shrubs survive the cold nights of the puna.

Borrowed through American Spanish puna from Quechua puna ("high Andean region"). The regional name also developed the medical sense "altitude sickness," the meaning Darwin records in his Cordillera crossing.

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