tinamou

noun

tin·​a·​mou ˈti-nə-ˌmü 

: any of a family (Tinamidae) of South and Central American ground-dwelling birds that have a deeply keeled sternum and a rudimentary tail and that produce large glossy usually colorful eggs

Examples of tinamou in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

This suggests that the common ancestor of the ratites and the tinamou could fly, and while the tinamou held onto this skill, the branches leading to other ratites became flightless again and again. —Elizabeth Preston, Discover Magazine, 22 May 2014

Animals such as tinamou, a bird the local Indigenous people consider sacred, even scarcer. —Marina Dias, Washington Post, 18 Feb. 2023

Panguana’s name comes from the local word for the undulated tinamou, a species of ground bird common to the Amazon basin. —New York Times, 18 June 2021

Word History

Etymology

French, from Carib tinamu

First Known Use

circa 1783, in the meaning defined above