Chrysophlegma is a

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial n ...

of birds in the woodpeckers family

Picidae Woodpeckers are part of the bird family Picidae, which also includes the piculets, wrynecks, and sapsuckers. Members of this family are found worldwide, except for Australia, New Guinea, New Zealand, Madagascar, and the extreme polar region ...

. These species, found in

South South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþa ...

and

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consistin ...

, were all previously assigned to the genus ''

Picus Picus was a figure in Roman mythology, the first king of Latium. He was the son of Saturn, also known as Stercutus. He was the founder of the first Latin tribe and settlement, Laurentum, located a few miles to the Southeast of the site of the lat ...

''.

Taxonomy

The species now placed in ''Chrysophlegma'' were previously assigned to the genus ''

''. A

molecular phylogenetic Molecular phylogenetics () is the branch of phylogeny that analyzes genetic, hereditary molecular differences, predominantly in DNA sequences, to gain information on an organism's evolutionary relationships. From these analyses, it is possible to ...

study published in 2008 found that the genus ''Picus'', as then defined, formed two separate clades and might not be

monophyletic In cladistics for a group of organisms, monophyly is the condition of being a clade—that is, a group of taxa composed only of a common ancestor (or more precisely an ancestral population) and all of its lineal descendants. Monophyletic ...

. Three species were therefore moved from ''Picus'' into the resurrected genus ''Chrysophlegma'', which had been introduced in 1850 by the English ornithologist

John Gould John Gould (; 14 September 1804 – 3 February 1881) was an English ornithologist. He published a number of monographs on birds, illustrated by plates produced by his wife, Elizabeth Gould, and several other artists, including Edward Lear, ...

to accommodate the

greater yellownape The greater yellownape (''Chrysophlegma flavinucha'') is a species of bird in the woodpecker family Picidae. It is found in East Asia from northern and eastern India to south-eastern China, Indochina, Hainan, and Sumatra. Its natural habitats ar ...

(''Chrysophlegma flavinucha''). The genus name combines the

Classical Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

''khrusos'' meaning "gold" and ''phlegma'' meaning "flame" or "fire". The genus contains 3 species.

References

Bird genera {{woodpecker-stub