Turdidae
/tɜːrˈdɪdiːə/noun
The bird family containing thrushes, blackbirds, robins, and related songbirds.
Did you know?Although Turdidae resembles the modern English word “turd,” the two words are not historically related; the family name comes from Latin turdus, meaning “thrush.”
Etymological Timeline
Proto-Indo-European
PIE
*trozdos
“A reconstructed word believed to refer to a thrush or similar bird.”
Proto-Germanic
Proto-Germanic
*þruskōn
“A thrush; the ancestor of later Germanic bird names.”
Old English
Old English
þrysc
“Thrush, a songbird.”
Classical Latin
Latin
turdus
“Thrush.”
1758
Scientific Latin
Turdus
“Linnaeus’s genus name for the thrushes.”
19th Century
Scientific Latin
Turdidae
“The zoological family name formed from Turdus with the standard family suffix -idae.”