Kuril Ainu was an extinct and poorly attested language of the Ainu family, spoken on the Kuril Islands, specifically Kunashir, Iturup and Urup in the south and Shumshu in the north, before its speakers relocated to Kamchatka and Hokkaido as territorial control of the islands changed. Its speaker population is thought to have represented a relatively recent expansion from Hokkaido. Documentation is sparse; one recorded source is a Kuril Ainu glossary compiled by Captain V. M. Golovnin in 1811. The language is generally dated as having gone extinct by 1962, though that specific date lacks a firm citation.
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