HBWAlive Key; mission accomplished or mission impossible? (1 Viewer)

I have been trying to think laterally about this, to move away from Lidia/Lidie as a name. I looked at anagrams (adieu li); I followed Mulsant's publications, and found (as I know next to nothing about hummingbirds) through the index of plates of his Histoire naturelle des oiseaux-mouches that there are quite a few genera of hummingbirds that have the prefix eu-, i.e. from Greek ευ = beautiful. So far nothing new.

But the latter kept nagging. Let's take the eu- prefix as is, and focus on the word lidia. I ended up going back to Wiktionary. In Spanish lidia is a form of the verb lidiar = to fight, battle, argue, litigate, oppose, etc. I tried to find whether this bird is particularly aggressive, but found no accounts of such.

I ended up on the Portuguese page of lídia, which it tells me is an adjective relating to Lydian > Lydia.

Greek etymology of Lydia tells us: Λυδία (Ludía, “the region of Lydia”), from λυδία (ludía, “beautiful one, noble one”).

Could it be that Eulidia is a tautological construction: both eu- and lidia meaning beautiful, the beautiful one?

Joek, There is much merit in what you have written, although I have not yet found ludia, in the meaning of beauteous or noble one, in my usual dictionaries. Nonetheless, I have added your thoughts to the Key entry of Eulidia.

Eulidia MULSANT (& Verreaux) 1877

• Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire Illustré Latin-Français, Hachette (here):

lūdǐa, æ, f. (ludius), danseuse: ...
[...]
lūdǐus, ǐi, m (ludus), histrion, pantomime, danseur: ...

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If such a combination is possible (?!?), turning lūdǐa into (Eu-)lidia, as in beutiful dancer (alt. a pretty dancing-girl) would make sense (at least to me) ... on any small agile Hummingbird.

For what it's worth.

/B

But this 'ludia' would be pure Latin, then... (< ludo, to play a game; ludius is an actor or performer (one who plays a game), or a gladiator (one who takes part in games); ludia is the female equivalent: an actress, a female performer or dancer, a female gladiator, as well as a gladiator's wife or mistress.)

'y's are rather frequently turned into 'i's (and the other way around) by French workers, because the two letters are pronounced the same in French. So, starting from Greek, a sequence Λυδία => Lydia => Lidia would not be extremely surprising. A Latin 'u' being turned into an 'i' (Ludia => Lidia) would be much more unexpected, because the pronunciation is different. (Not to mention that the stem "lud" would presumably be familiar to any French-speaker, because we have words that derive from it in French -- 'ludique', 'éluder', 'alluder', 'prélude', etc. -- which should in principle make the probability of an accidental corruption smaller.)

After reading Roek's approach to the name Eulidia and Björn's reaction about elegantly moving fairly-like hummers, I feel inclined to call the use of Portuguese and Spanish words "ludiek" (Dutch, from French: ludique = playful). but in the English dictionary I only found "ludicrous", the meaning of which is definitely more offensive. The Eulidia hummingbird is not especially elegant nor beautiful, not more so than other species; the most obvious character seems to be the reduced size of the bird (and maybe the shape of the rectrices, as I mentioned in an earlier message). So the prefix eu- seems out of place anyway.
In Dutch we have a saying (in translation) "to be at the end of one's Latin", when run out of arguments.
I have another playful contribution to enhance the quantity of impossibilities: Eileithyia, "she who appears", daughter of Greek deities Zeus and Hera, goddess of birth. Wrong vocals, wrong consonants? Well, who cares
with the beauty of the country Lydia and the Aeolids in the background, in all those approaches to achieve an explanation . . .?
I am not mocking, I just express my doubts during this interludium (period between playing activities). We all give in to wild fantasy now and then; James is the one to decide about a permanent place for them in his Key.
Jan van der Brugge

Some of the things mentioned here surprises me because as a non-linguist I know the meaning of 'eu' as

The prefix (eu-) means good, well, pleasant or true. It is derived from the Greek eu meaning well and eus meaning good.

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(quote from here)

As such, I would expect Eulidia to be 'the true lidia' (whatever that second part means).

Niels

Hi Niels,
What you write, would naturally be the first step in investigating any name (would Europe and Euripides be exceptions?). However, the -lidia part is where it stops, unless this would originally be the second element of another generic name, in which the first part would have been eliminated. But where to look for such a combination (if not in other generic names)? The prefix would then, as expected, just stress the qualities or essence of that original genus or underline the similarities of the new genus with it. To make clear what I mean, I can give the a comparison of generic names beginning with Pseudo-: such names lead attention to the generic name which is attached to that prefix, and by the prefix at once stress the fact that there are some differences from the attached (part of) name. If there would be a name Pseudolidia, we would be confronted with the same problem: where does the -lidia part come from?
There is no "well-shaped" or "well-equipped" Lidia nor a "false" (pseudo) Lidia . . . That is exactly the reason why other combinations in this topic have been suggested and discussed: eu- as a mistake for eo-, eul- as the start of the name instead of eu-, the whole term as a personal name (sustained by the French term Eulidie, but that has no special meaning, because Mulsant also speaks of Eulidiaires and Acesturaires, terms without any taxonomic status). An extra problem would also rise in Pseudo- by the way, because there you would not only have to look for the attached generic name, but also take in account that the -o of Pseudo- could be the first letter of the attached generic name! (Pseudothello, not from "Thello", but from Othello)
Well, I hope I have somewhat clarified this recent exchange of views for you and the complications that we are dealing with. Even without the success of discovering an acceptable explanation there is no flaw in fascination for the linguistic possibilities. Maybe you might dive into it as well (can be useful for the Opus)!
Cheers, Jan van der Brugge

Eulidia ...

Could this possibly (somehow) be the origin of E(u)lidia ... ?

Elïdo, I crush, squeeze. Fr. lædo, I hurt; like Collido. E increases the force. See Edomo.

[An Etymological Dictionary of the Latin Language, by F. E. J. Valpy (1828), here, on p.134]​

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What "special shape of the outer rectrices" (as Jan wrote it, in post #400), are we talking about? Does Mulsant possibly talk of a (clearly, true, very) narrow, concave alt. "squeezed" shape of its tail feathers?

Anyone who knows French (and Latin) ... ?

Link to OD in post #383.

/B

The Well-squeezed Woodstar . . .
Here is the French text on the rectrices of Mulsant's Eulidie de Yarell (sic) in Hist.Nat.Oiseaux-mouches ou Colibris, E.Mulsant & E.Verreaux, Tome IV, I, 1877, pp.115-116:
Queue singulière, à rectrices médiaires et submédiaires vertes; les autres brunes; les médiaires très-courtes, au moins aussi larges que longues, terminés en ogive; les submédiaires aussi longues que la moitié des intermédiaires, assez larges à la base, graduellement rétrécies dans leur seconde moitié et terminées en angle aigu; les intermédiaires à externes de longueur presque égale, une fois plus longues que les submédiaires, étroites et parallèles sur leur deux tiers basilaires, plus étroites sur leur tiers postérieur et terminées en pointe, en forme de lame de yatagan; les externes, plus étroites que les précédentes, sublinéaires et terminées en pointe.
La femelle a la queue arquée en arrière; les rectrices assez larges, subarrondies à l'extrémité.

Translated: Tail remarkable, with median and submedian rectrices green, the others brown; the median ones very short, at least as broad as long, ending in an arch; the submedian as long as the half of the intermedian, rather broad at their base, gradually squeezed in the second half and ending in a sharp angle; the intermedian rectrices on the outside nearly of the same length, twice as long as the submedian ones, narrow, parallelous and ending in a point, which has the shape of the blade of a yatagan; the external ones narrower than the precedents, sublinear and ending in a point.
The female has the tail square at its end; the rectries rather broad, and rounded at their ends.

I did not know the word yatagan, which is not French, of course; it is a weapon, also called Turkish sword, named after a historic city in Turkey. Characters of this sword are: one-sided cutting, the blade is "forwardly curved" = curved inward from halfway towards the top.

Information from HBW vol.5, pp.670 (plate) and 674: Chilean Woodstar, Myrtis yarrellii. Tail like M.fanny, Purple-collared Woodstar, one inch, but outer six rectrices longer and sharply pointed, with very narrow inner web and outer web narrowing towards the top. (The last part looks like being just the shaft on the plate)

Just for reading pleasure this sentence from A.W.Johnson, The Birds of Chile, vol.II, p.121 (nice older books, rather bad illustrations, plenty of typo's in them . . .):
"Picaflor Chico de Arica - Chilean Woodstar. Not larger than a moth, this tiny bit of high-speed life must surely rank with the Bee Hummingbird of Cuba as one of the very smallest birds in the world."

Mulsant and Verreaux presented several new generic names in their Hist.Nat.Oiseaux-mouches: Manilia, Leucaria, Amalusia, Arinia, Polyxemus, Eucephala. They can be found, with explanations (partly from mythology), in the HBW Key of scientific names. Eulidia could not be traced, as stated earlier; with this text from the original source I still feel too much guessing in trying to solve this enigmatic name, so I prefer to dedicate the name "Well-squeezed Hummingbird" to Björn, who could well think up a Swedish name for it. ;-)
Enjoy, Jan van der Brugge

Thanks for the "Well-squeezed Hummingbird", Jan, but I think the Swedish Taxonomy (and Name) Committée will disregard; väl sammanpressad kolibri (as the Swedish name for the Eulidia Hummingbird). It sounds like a (poor) all compressed bird, having ended up in a mangle (or a printing press). Compared to that I definitely prefer the Common/Vernacular names as they are; Chilean Woodstar, and chilensk skogsjuvel (in Swedish), for Eulidia yarrellii.

Björn

PS. I actually thought I was onto something, with the squeezed Latin Elïdo in connection to Eulidia, and its squeezed tail feathers. Sigh!

The search goes on!

• argoondah as in "Coturnix Argoondah" SYKES 1832.
In 1841 argoodah was described as "of the natives" in other words an autochthonym .
Coturnix Argunda.) Fig. 1749. Die nähere Kenntniß der Felsenwachtel–Argunda der Eingeborenen – verdankt man dem um die Naturgeschichte Indiens verdienten Sykes. Diese hinsichtlich der Färbung im Ganzen von den anderen Arten. Page 200 of llustrirte Naturgeschichte des Thierreichs: Anatomie, Physiologi.
https://books.google.com/books?id=r...edir=0&dq=Argunda+Sykes&source=gbs_navlinks_s .

Re. argoondah as in "Coturnix Argoondah"

mb1848 said:

...
In 1841 argoodah was described as "of the natives" in other words an autochthonym .
...

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Mark, in what book/work/paper/journal (of 1841) did you find this information? The book, in your link (in post #411), seems to be from 1848 ... ?

And note that it wasn't listed by the local name "Argoondah", or anything similar, neither by E. W. Oates (1898), here, nor by A. Le Messurier (1888) here, or by E. C. Stuart Baker (1923) here.

Did you possibly mean this work, by W. H. Sykes himself? Plate here. Though I cannot find any note of a local name in it? At least not in the entry for the "Coturnix Argoondah" itself (a k a "Rock Quail of Dukhun").

Please enlighten me (and us).

/B
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mb1848 said:

• argoondah as in "Coturnix Argoondah" SYKES 1832.
In 1841 argoodah was described as "of the natives" in other words an autochthonym .
Coturnix Argunda.) Fig. 1749. Die nähere Kenntniß der Felsenwachtel–Argunda der Eingeborenen – verdankt man dem um die Naturgeschichte Indiens verdienten Sykes. Diese hinsichtlich der Färbung im Ganzen von den anderen Arten.

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Maybe easier to use this link here.

@ Björn: Argunda der Eingeborenen means Argunda of the natives. I have no clue how Eduard Friedrich Poeppig got this information.

argoondah

Taphrospilus said:

...
@ Björn: Argunda der Eingeborenen means Argunda of the natives. I have no clue how Eduard Friedrich Poeppig got this information.

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Thanks Martin, but even I (with my meager German) understood the meaning of Poeppig's words "Argunda der Eingeborenen", (even if I couldn't understand Poeppig's full text), I was more interested in the 1841 work that Mark referred to. I wondered if (and hoped) he'd found that exact information/origin (elsewhere).

However (as Mark seems to be off-line) also compare with what's told in A Dictionary of scientific bird names originating from the Indian region, by Aasheesh Pittie (2004), here, p.3, or see its attached entry for argoondah (the first quoted parted, inside quotation marks, is allegedly from Jobling's dictionary of 1995).

Considering the geography of "Coturnix Argoondah, apparently discovered in Dukhun [today's Deccan (Plateau), in South East India] I started to wonder if this name truly could origin in/from a local name for the Manipur Bush-quail (today's Perdicula manipurensis), which is a species with a more North Eastern range (and fairly different-looking), ... though it's not as northern (and similar-looking) as the Jungle Bush-quail Perdicula asiatica.

HBW Alive (itself):

• Rock Bush-quail Pedicula argoondah (here)
• Manipur Bush-quail P. manipurensis (here)
• Jungle Bush-quail Perdicula asiatica (here)

Also compare with the (somewhat) similar name "Auriconnaı" [sic, no dot over the ending i] for the (latter, alt. nominate ssp.) Jungle Bush-quail "Perdicula asiatica asiatica", mentioned here ... a local (Santhali/Santali) name, which (if nothing else) is just about as similar to "Argoondah" as James's suggested origin.

To me, it seems like "Argoondah" could originate in a local (Indian) name for a (any?) unspecified Quail (from the northern, or north eastern, parts of India (possibly the Jungle Bush-quail), but I haven't been able to narrow it down closer than this.

Björn

PS. Also note that the year of the OD differ in Pittie (2004) vs today's HBW Alive Key (and, of course, also in the HBW Alive itself)

"Coturnix Argoondah" ... continuation (and End)

In both A manual of the game birds of India, by W. E. Oates (1898) and in The fauna of British India, including Ceylon and Burma, by Oates & W T. Blanford (same year, vol 4) the Jungle Bush-quail (Perdicula asiatica) was called "Auriconnai" (here resp. here), now suddenly written with a dot over the ending i.

Also (even if no local names were included) see Gould's depicted "Perdicula argoondah" (from 1863), here, and note that the birds (on Pl.5") was listed (by Stuart Baker, in 1923) as "Gould (nec Sykes)", among the synonyms of Perdicula asiatica asiatica (here) ... !? For Gould's entry regarding P. asiatica, see the preceding pages (and Plate 4).

If pronounced (in a thick Indian dialect/tongue) I assume "Auriconnai" would sound about the same as (or similar to) "argoondah". Maybe this is what Sykes heard?

Well, that's it, I cannot reach any further on the origin of this name. Take it all for whatever it is worth.

argoondah ... over and out (at least on my part)!

/B
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"Coturnix Argoondah" ... again

Quick return (apparently hard to let go of this one) ...

And, now I've got it; the work by Poeppig/Pöppig was/is of 1851 (see title page, Martin's link in post 413, not 1848 as claimed by Google, Mark's link, #411), thereby it all make better sense (as in simply being a typo).

However, also see the comment by Strickland (1878) here. To me it looks like Pöppig simply latinized Sykes's Coturnix Argoondah (from South East India) into Argunda.

Also see Jerdon's foot-note (on p.96, for P. asiatica), in The game bird and wild fowl of India (1864), here.

And; take it all for whatever it is worth.

/B

Herr Hauser's (West European) Bullfinch

Here's a quick, brief attempt ... with an additional, tiny (possibly crucial) detail, that might be important on:

hauseri as in
• the invalid "Pyrrhula hauseri" KLEINSCHMIDT 1920 (OD in #383)

The holotype was collected in, or in the vicinity of; "Näfels, canton Glarus, Switzerland, 04.01.1899, leg. Hauser." (according to; Renate van den Elzen, 2010, Bonn zoological Bulletin 59: p.72). To me, simply based on what's written in Die Gefiederte Welt 26, from 1897 (here), it looks like we ought to trace/find a Herr/Mr "F. Hauser".

Note; that there's a long line of Hausers from "Näfels, canton Glarus" in Switzerland, however (this far) none linked to Kleinschmidt.

Also see Historisch-Biographisches Lexicon der Schweiz, and the entry for: HAUSER. In der deutschen Schweiz sehr verbreiterter Familienname (here, p.91).

... which doesn't help much (at least not for a Non-German speaker/reader, like me), as there are quite a few of them. The quoted (short) text above was/is followed by many, many (more or less famous) Hausers, also from the canton (Kanton) Glarus, as well as from elsewhere in Switzerland (and quite a few by the given name Fridolin) ... and so on.. But that's all I kind find. Nothing more.

Anyone who's fluent in German might be able to pick one or two, of the most likely candidates. And then, from there, maybe we can take if a bit further, hopefully, in some way connecting either one of them to Otto Kleinschmidt [Konrad Ernst Adolf Otto Kleinschmidt (1870-1954)].

Anyone keen?

Björn
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Quote: Anyone keen? Björn

Ja, ich selbstverständlich! Well, seriously and modestly now:

From HBW Key to scientific names:
hauseri
Eponym (Kleinschmidt 1920, Falco, 16, 4); doubtless after a member of the Hauser family of Canton Glarus, Switzerland, who provided numerous cantonal presidents (syn. Pyrrhula pyrrhula europaea).

Kleinschmidt did not quite leave us with his remark in Falco 16, 1920, he added: More in Berajah. In Falco (Berajah), Jahrgang XIX, Nr.1, 1923, p.2 he gave an "A-B-C - Unterricht für Ornithologische Sammler. Literatur", where listed: W.Hagen, Die deutsche Vogelwelt nach ihrem Standort, Magdeburg 1922. Derselbe: Unsere Vögel und ihre Lebensverhältnisse, Freiburg i.B. 1922. Die beiden Schriften enthalten neben ausziehend geschriebenem Text nette Naturaufnahmen und andere Abbildungen 1).

The footnote 1) reads: Die erstere auch Zeichnungen von FRITZ HAUSER, dem eifrigen Beobachter und Sammler von Alpenvögeln. Meine Sammlung enthält wie die von ERLANGER, KOENIG und anderen manches Erinnerungsstück an diesen liebenswürdigen früh verstorbenen Ornithologen. Das von ihm beschaffte Material hat zur Lösung mancher wichtigen Frage beigetragen.

Translation: The first one of these (publications has) also plates by Fritz Hauser, the diligent observer and collector of Alpine birds. My collection contains, like those of Erlanger, Koenig and others many a specimen in memory to this amiable and early deceased ornithologist. The material forwarded by him has contributed to the solution of several important questions.

I had no luck in tracing Werner Hagen's book of 1922. There might be any further information in descriptions of the collections of Erlanger and Koenig. However, from the holotype of Pyrrhula hauseri we already know that is was collected in Glarus, Switzerland, in 1899. In combination with the collector's first name Fritz and Kleinschmidt's remark that he died at a young age the way to identification has become somewhat narrower.
Anyone keen in deeper Alpine research?
Ich wünsche guten Erfolg dazu, Jan van der Brugge

Fritz Hauser's Bullfinch

Thanks Jan, Werner Hagen's book Die deutsche Vogelwelt nach ihrem Standort. Ein Beitrag zur Zoogeographie Deutschlands und zugleich ein Excursionsbuch zum Kennenlernen der Vögel (1922), full access US only (here). Some of Herr Hauser's Art work is to be seen here.

To me (with very little understanding of German) it looks like we're searching for a Swizz or Austrian (?) Baron Fritz Hauser, (amateur) naturalist, Artist (illustrator), collector, etc., ... also illustrator of the book Die Alpenflora. Mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der Ostalpen. Nach der Natur gemalt von Baron Fritz Hauser. Herausgegeben (mit Einleitung und begleitendem Text versehen von C. J. Oehninger), 1908, where he contributed with (130 Abbildungen in Farbenkunstdruck auf 24 Tafeln) ... who died in 1910/11, if not, at least in/prior to the early 1920's (?) .... maybe even a Frederick/Friedrich/Fridolin "Fritz" Hauser?

Also see; here, here, here, here, here and here (all in German) ... if of any help? However, no direct connection to Kleinschmidt found.

How about this (and this) Austrian naturalist; Herr Fritz Hauser (1868–1910), or is that a completely different Hauser ... ?!?

Simply fumbling around in the dark ....

Björn

PS. Either way; he's not to be confused with the Swiss (jazz) percussionist Fritz Hauser (he is still drumming away)
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hauseri. Thanks Jan and Bjorn, for narrowing the field and enabling me to amend (temporarily) the Key entry. Baron Fritz Hauser, the naturalist and artist, seems like a good bet, but I wouldn't like to go further without his dates (did he die young?)