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An Inquiry Into the History of the Current English Names of North American Land Birds

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An Inquiry Into the History of the Current English Names of North American Land Birds 346 TROTTER,English Names of American Birds. LOct.[Auk AN INQUIRY INTO THE HISTORY OF THE CURRENT ENGLISH NAMES OF NORTH AMERICAN LAND BIRDS. BY SPENCER TROTTER. TECt•NICALnomenclature is the embodimentof that orderly and definitearrangement of knowledgewhich constitutes a science. It servesto symbolizea conceptionof the relationshipsthat exist betweenliving beings,one with another,and is at oncethe ex- pressionof a logicalsystem of classification;a workingbasis for the ideal scheme which the mind constructs from observed facts. It is eminentlya rationalprocess. In directcontrast to thisis the vernacular- the loose,quite indefinite and oftenhaphazard way of namingthings, that has its root in the soil of commonlife. The stratumout of whichit springsis emotional rather thanrational. In ornithologythese two contrastedforms of the embodiedideal- the technical or scientific and the vernacular names -- have been of moreequal value than in many other branchesof natural history, fromthe fact that birdshave always presented themselves to men's mindsin a peculiarlyattractive way. Mostof usthink of thevarious kindsof birds,certainly of the morefamiliar ones, in termsof the vernacularrather than in the garb of science. A SongSparrow is a SongSparrow more often than a Melospizamelodia as well to the ornithologistas to theuntechnical wayfarer. A respectableantiquity attaches itself to the vernacular. Long beforethe scientificmind had invadedthe field of natural history the folk had givenvoice to its ideasabout various animate and in- animate things. A vast vocabularyof popular nameswas an early heritageof the commonpeople. With this stockof names and notionsabout Old World birdsthe colonistsin Virginia and New Englandwere fairly well equipped,and the morefamiliar birdsof the new countrysoon received names indicative of some trait or likeness to certain of the Old World varieties. Mark Cateshyin his History of Carolinawas the first one to give any substantialaccount of American birds, and his work contains an Vol.1909XX¾I' JI TROTTER,English Names of AmericanBirds. 347 array of names,some of them moreor lessfamiliar in the speechof to-day. To William Bartram we owe a largenumber of our com- mon bird names,names that reachedthe intellectualworld of eigh- teenthcentury England through the worksof Edwards,Pennant and Latham. AlexanderWilson was likewisea large debtor to Bartram for the namesof numerousspecies, but he blazedhis owntrail by applyingnames to speciesdiscovered by himselfas well asin the recastingof manyBartramian names. In the presentinquiry I havearranged the matterof the history of ourAmerican bird namesunder the followingsix heads -- I. Namesof Old Englishorigin applied to AmericanBirds• II. Namesderived from a Latin equivalent. III. Namessuggested by voice. IV. Namessuggested by somepeculiar habit or habitat. V. Namessuggested by coloror otherexternal feature. VI. Names suggestedby geographicallocality (place-names) or in honorof someperson. I. NAMES OF OLD ENGLISH ORIGIN. Many of the Catesbiannames of birdsundoubtedly originated in the vernacularof the colonistsand someare dearlyof Old English ancestry. In the main they are of genericrather than of specific application,as is the easewith mostof the folk terms for natural objects. The specificdistinction is oftenone of localitymerely, as for example"the euekowof Carolina." Relationshipis often broadlyrecognized by the peopleand embodied in a generalname with appropriatequalifications to indicateminor differencesor differencesin distribution.The "species"of theprofanmr• vulgus, however,more nearly corresponds to the genericconception of the naturalist, even in some eases to the idea embodied in the term "family." A numberof theseOld World bird names,given to American birds,appear very early in the historyof Englishspeech. In a vocabularycompiled by Archbishop./Elftie toward the doseof the tenthcentury (955-1020 A.D.) thereis a •VominaAvim• in which a numberof bird namesappear, though somewhat different from their modern form. In this list the Robin Redbreast is called 348 T•OTT•,I•,English Names of American Birds. LOct['Auk "rudduc" or "ruddock" which long continuedto be its general Englishname and is probablystill alive in localdialects. The word appearsas a variantof the modern "ruddy," refertrig no doubt to the russet of the bird's breast. The earliest recorded instance of the useof thepopular epithet "robin," which as a wordof endearment hasbeen transfe•'ed to manydifferent birds thoughout the English speakingworld, occurs in the NominaAz, ium of an Englishvocab- ularyof the fifteenthcentury where tl•e nmne appears as "tobynet redbreast,"literally "little robin redbreast:"Our American Robinwas known to theearly southern colonists as the "Fieldfare" and is sotermed by Catesby("The Fieldfareof Carolina,"Vol. I, 29). The bird hasmany of the qualitiesof the Fieldfare,and like its Britishcongener came from the northin autumn,scattering over the clearedlands in looseflocks. William Bartram (Travels, 290) speaksof it as the "Fieldfareor robinredbreast," and Kalm men- tions it under the latter name (EnglishTrans., II, 90). Our familiar name "robin" is thus a contraction of the" robin redbreast" of old Englishspeech. In the Nomina A•i•m of 2Elfricthe cuckoooccurs as "geac." In someprovincial dialects it is still calleda "gowk,"a survivalof the little alteredAnglo-Saxon name. "Cuckoo" or "Cuckow" (thelatter an earlierform of thename and given as such by Cateshy) is undoubtedlyderived through later Norman speech(th'ench coucoa;Italian cuccoor cuculo;old Englishcuccu). The German name kuckukor koekoek,the Danish kukker or gj6g, and the Swedishg6k are clearly allied to the Anglo-Saxongeac or gowk,all beingundoubted variants expressive of the bird'svoice, and the same is true of "cuckoo" and its variants. • The colonists were not deceivedin givingto theAmerican species its rightfulname, though Cateshymay havebeen the first to bestowit. "Crow" appearsin 2Elfric'svocabulary as erawe; "kite" as glida and glede,the last name continuingdown to the fifteenth century. The AngloSaxon stae?'n or staer(later stare) has become the modern"starling." A manuscriptin the Royal Library at Brussels,of eleventh • To call a man a "gawk" (simpleton)appears equivalent to calling him a "cuckoo," a term of no uncertain meaning in the old days. Vol.1909XXVI'] .l Tao•r•rEa,English Names ofAmerican Birds. 349 centurydate, contains a numberof bird namesamong which are the Gos-hafoe(literally "Goose hawk") modernizedto "Goshawk," and Spear-hafoe("Sparrow hawk"). It seemscurious that our little AmericanSparrow Hawk has not bornethe name of its near relativethe I(estrelrather than that of the quitedifferent Sparrow Hawk of the Old World. "Turtle" was an old name for the Dove andappears as such in Catesby("The Turtleof Carolina,"I, 24). It originated,asSkeat observes, from an effort to express the cooing noteand is altogetherdifferent from the wordused to designate the reptileof the samename. This lastwas rendered by English sailorsinto "turtle" fromthe Spanishtortuga. Wren, Sparrowand Swallowappear in theseold vocabularies as Wraenna,Spearwa and Swealewe. The first of thesenames Skeat assertsis derivedfrom a base Wrin, to squeal,chirp or whine, in allusion to the bird's voice. A curiousold belief existed amongthe folk of severalEuropean countries that the Wren was the "King of Birds." Hence,probably the genericterm Regulus formerlyapplied to variousspecies of Wren, and, likewise,its Englishequivalent "Kinglet." "Sparrow"is literallya "flutterer" (Spar,to quiver),and "Swallow" meansa "tosser,or moverto and fro; from its flight" (Skeat). "Lark" has been softened down from the Old English "laverok" or "laverock" (Anglo- Saxon laverce),literally "a Worker of Guile," from some old superstitionregarding the bird as of ill omen. The bestowalof this name upon an Americanbird allied to the starlingswas no doubtdue to an efforton the part of the earlysettlers to namebirds afterthe more familiar ones of thehomeland. The ground-nesting habits,the long hind claw, the loud twitteringflight notesand clearsong of the Americanbird mayhave given some slight reason for thisincongruous title. "Thrush" with its variants "throstle" and "throstle-kok," as appliedto the SongThrush (Turdusmusicus) of Europe,is an old word and appearsin its older forms in a treatiseby Walter deBiblesworth at theend of thethirteenth century. In theBrussels Manuscript"throstle" seems to referto the MisselThrush (Turdus ,isei•orus). The SongThrush is alsoreferred to by its otherold Englishname of "Maviz" (later"Mavis"). In thissame treatise of de Biblesworth'sthe EuropeanBlackbird (Turdus ,r,erula) is 350 TROTTER,English Na•nes of AmericanBirds. LOct.[-Auk spokenof as "osel" or "hosel-brit,"and likewiseby its Old English Name of "Merle." Later it became"Ousel-eoek" as in the quaint ditty in Midsummer-Nights'Dream- "The ousel-cock,so black of hue, With orange-tawny bill, The throstle with his note so true, The wren with little quill. The finch, the sparrow, and the lark, The plain-songcuckoo grey, Whose note full many a man doth mark, And dares not answer,nay; .... " "Mawys" or "Mavis" as a dialecticname has lasteddown to the presentday in the countiesof EastEngland. It seemscurious that it was not transferredto any Amerieanthrush notably the Wood Thrush. "Osel" is clearlythe parent word of the modern "Ousel" and in this latter form is still appliedto an allied species of the EuropeanBlackbird -- the Ring-ousel(T. torquatus),as well as to a dlstinet,though
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