Montezuma's revenge

[ mon-tuh-zoo-muhz ri-venj ]

noun

, Slang.

1. traveler's diarrhea, especially as experienced by some visitors to Mexico.

Montezuma's revenge

noun

1. informal.
   an acute attack of infectious diarrhoea, esp when experienced in Mexico by tourists

Word History and Origins

Origin of Montezuma's revenge¹

1960–65, Americanism; in allusion to Montezuma II ( def ), who was killed by invading Europeans

Example Sentences

And if they don’t invite the Aztecs after all this, well, beware of Montezuma’s revenge.

From Seattle Times

An algorithm that made headlines for mastering the notoriously difficult Atari 2600 game Montezuma’s Revenge, can now beat more games, achieving near perfect scores, and help robots explore real-world environments.

From Scientific American

Pepper, who came down with an apparent case of Montezuma’s revenge during his stay, later came to believe that my grandfather had secretly poisoned him so that he could spend more time with his beautiful wife.

From New York Times

A game like Montezuma’s Revenge reasonably expects the player to know that keys open doors before they play, so that when a door won’t open, the next obvious move is to find a key.

From Salon

What’s interesting is that some Atari games, like Montezuma’s Revenge, are trivial for children to learn but incredibly difficult for machines, even with deep learning.

From Salon