means Meat that's been cut into strips and dried (often salted or seasoned) so it keeps for ages without spoiling, yielding a tough, chewy snack.

from From Spanish 'charqui,' which the Spanish borrowed from Quechua 'ch'arki' — the word for dried, salted meat used by the peoples of the Andes long before Europeans arrived. English ears reshaped the unfamiliar sounds into the homier 'jerky,' a folk-friendly spelling that has nothing to do with jerking or sudden movements, despite the coincidental resemblance.