''Panyptila'' is a genus of
swifts
Swift or SWIFT most commonly refers to:
* SWIFT, an international organization facilitating transactions between banks
** SWIFT code
* Swift (programming language)
* Swift (bird), a family of birds
It may also refer to:
Organizations
* SWIFT, a ...
in the family
Apodidae
The Apodidae, or swifts, form a family of highly aerial birds. They are superficially similar to swallows, but are not closely related to any passerine species. Swifts are placed in the order Apodiformes along with hummingbirds. The treeswifts ar ...
. The two species are found in Central and South America.
Taxonomy
The genus ''Panyptila'' was introduced in 1847 by the German ornithologist
Jean Cabanis
Jean Louis Cabanis (8 March 1816 – 20 February 1906) was a German ornithologist. He worked at the bird collections of the Natural History Museum in Berlin becoming its first curator of birds in 1850. He founded the ''Journal für Ornithologie ...
with the
lesser swallow-tailed swift as the
type species
In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...
. The genus name combines the
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...
''panu'' meaning "very" or "exceedingly" with ''ptilon'' meaning "wing".
The genus contains two species:
*
Great swallow-tailed swift (''Panyptila sanctihieronymi'')
*
Lesser swallow-tailed swift (''Panyptila cayennensis'')
References
Bird genera
Taxonomy articles created by Polbot
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