The name Akalat (1 Viewer)

[Jim LeNomenclatoriste]

Hi all

What is the origin of the name Akalat and what is the typical bird of this name? Does it designate a specific species or is it a general name?

 

[njlarsen]

For the second part of your question, see for example this page

Category:Sheppardia - BirdForum Opus

www.birdforum.net

Niels

 

[Xenospiza]

The original name is from West Africa, but could well be for a different little brown bird:

Akalat - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Jim LeNomenclatoriste]

So the name Akalat originally designated a species belonging to this genus. We don't know where it comes from linguistically, etymologically ?

I would like to retrace the history of this name and in particular its first mention in ornithological literature.

 

[James Jobling]

In my Dictionary of English Bird Names MS I have:
"AKALAT A Bulu (West African) name for the Brown Akalat, Brown Thrush-Babbler or Brown Illadopsis Illadopsis fulvescens (Bates, 1930, Handbook Birds West Africa, p. 379).

 

[Jim LeNomenclatoriste]

In my Dictionary of English Bird Names MS I have:
"AKALAT Apparently a Bulu (African) name for the small robin-like akalats Sheppardia, but also used for the babblers Illadopsis (Illadopsis) and Pseudoalcippe (Hill Babbler) (e.g. in Cave and Macdonald (1955) where Sheppardia is used as a subst. English name for S. aequatorialis ). The akalats are confined to the Afrotropics, and most of the spp. are named for explorers or collectors in Africa or cabinet ornithologists specializing in the Afrotropical avifauna (e.g. Alexander’s Akalat S. poensis, Bocage’s Akalat S. bocagei ), or after African type locales to reflect their limited distribution (e.g. Gabela Akalat S. gabela, Iringa Akalat S. lowei )".

Ok thank you. I try to make sure to respect the ornithological history of the names used in my list but there are cases like this where I have to make concessions. In French, Akalat is given to several genera in the Pellorneidae while Sheppardia is named "Cossyphe" (rather than "Rougegorge" used in several authorities).

 

[James Jobling]

Jim, as ever you are faster than the speeding bullet: see my revised entry #5

 

[Jim LeNomenclatoriste]

Jim, as ever you are faster than the speeding bullet: see my revised entry #5

Rahh, you edited ><

In this case, it's perfect!

 

[James Jobling]

Jim, I note that Dowsett & Forbes-Watson, 1993, Checklist of Birds of the Afrotropical and Malagasy Regions, I, pp. 66, 82, use the French substantives Akalat for Pogonocichla, Swynnertonia, Sheppardia sharpei, S. gunningi, and S. gabela; Rougegorge for Stiphrornis; Cossyphe for Sheppardia bocagei, S. montana, and S. lowei; Merle rougegorge for Sheppardia cyornithopsis and S. aequatorialis; Grive-akalat for Modulatrix, Kakamega, Illadopsis and Ptyrticus; and Alcippe for Pseudoalcippe.

 

[Jim LeNomenclatoriste]

Jim, I note that Dowsett & Forbes-Watson, 1993, Checklist of Birds of the Afrotropical and Malagasy Regions, I, pp. 66, 82, use the French substantives Akalat for Pogonocichla, Swynnertonia, Sheppardia sharpei, S. gunningi, and S. gabela; Rougegorge for Stiphrornis; Cossyphe for Sheppardia bocagei, S. montana, and S. lowei; Merle rougegorge for Sheppardia cyornithopsis and S. aequatorialis; Grive-akalat for Modulatrix, Kakamega, Illadopsis and Ptyrticus; and Alcippe for Pseudoalcippe.

It was surely before the publication of CINFO (1993) but I revised the nomenclature of Cossyphinae since (I restricted Rougegorge for genus Erithacus only).

 

[James Jobling]

Dowsett & Forbes-Watson 1993 was published in October 1993.

 

[Jim LeNomenclatoriste]

Dowsett & Forbes-Watson 1993 was published in October 1993.

The authors may not have been aware of the work of CINFO and had used other, older sources.

 

[James Jobling]

Dowsett & Forbes-Watson, 1993 (Introduction, p. 2; References, p. 295), refer to Ouellet H., Devillers P. et al. In press. Noms français des oiseaux du monde. I assume this is the CINFO you mention.

 

[Jim LeNomenclatoriste]

Dowsett & Forbes-Watson, 1993 (Introduction, p. 2; References, p. 295), refer to Ouellet H., Devillers P. et al. In press. Noms français des oiseaux du monde. I assume this is the CINFO you mention.

Yes ! Some names in Dowsett & Forbes-Watson are different from CINFO (1993) and different from mine

 

[Andy Adcock]

My interpretation of this, is that it's a generic term for small, grey, brown, ground dwelling birds with it's origin in the Bulu (Bantu group) language?

Richard Bowdler Sharpe, who had never visited Africa, associated the akalats, in their Bulu appellation, with birds of "different kinds" occurring in the forest understorey.[8] His main collector in West Africa, George L. Bates, denoted them more specifically as "little members of the genus Turdinus, which are called in Fang and Bulu "Akalat"....".[9] The latter genus denoted a group of Old World babblers, currently classed as near-babblers in the genus Illadopsis.

 

[Jim LeNomenclatoriste]

Ouellet H., Devillers P. et al. In press. Noms français des oiseaux du monde. I assume this is the CINFO you mention.

But this book has become obsolete, which is why I completely revised the list correcting everything that was wrong, with the supervision of Normand David

 

[Björn Bergenholtz]

Hi all

What is the origin of the name Akalat and what is the typical bird of this name? Does it designate a specific species or is it a general name?

Jim, if still of interest ...

According to my notes the local (Bulu) Name Akalat was first noted by George Latimer Bates in 1901 (here, here and here). For other example/s; see here and here (from 1905), as well as; here, here and here (from 1908). Also note the similar local names/transciptions Ekwalat and Akwalat.

Also see:
• Handbook of Bulu: containing a grammatical sketch, folk-tales for reading and a vocabulary, here, by the same George Latimer Bates (1904):

akalat, small forest bird, three species of [i.e. at that point/by then (in 1904), in] Turdinus.

Hopefully of some use/help.

Björn

 

[Jim LeNomenclatoriste]

Jim, if still of interest ...

According to my notes the local (Bulu) Name Akalat was first noted by George Latimer Bates in 1901 (here, here and here). For other example/s; see here and here (from 1905), as well as; here, here and here (from 1908). Also note the similar local names/transciptions Ekwalat and Akwalat.

Also see:
• Handbook of Bulu: containing a grammatical sketch, folk-tales for reading and a vocabulary, here, by the same George Latimer Bates (1904):


Hopefully of some use/help.

Björn

Ok merci. The Turdinus in question is the current Illadopsis albipectus. 👌