tanager

See also: Tanager

English

From New Latin Tanagra, from Portuguese tangara, from Old Tupi tangara.[1]

tanager (plural tanagers)

Any of numerous species of often colorful passerine birds that inhabit New World forests, formerly all within the family Thraupidae, but now with some species placed in other families with birds such as finches and cardinals.
- 1907, Robert William Chambers, chapter V, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, OCLC 24962326:
  Breezes blowing from beds of iris quickened her breath with their perfume; she saw the tufted lilacs sway in the wind, and the streamers of mauve-tinted wistaria swinging, all a-glisten with golden bees; she saw a crimson cardinal winging through the foliage, and amorous tanagers flashing like scarlet flames athwart the pines.

American passerine birds