nightingale

• IPA^(key): /ˈnaɪtɪŋɡeɪl/

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From Middle English nyghtyngale, nightingale, niȝtingale, alteration (with intrusive n) of nyghtgale, nightegale, from Old English nihtegala, nihtegale (“nightingale; night-raven”, literally “night-singer”), from Proto-West Germanic *nahtigalā (“nightingale”), equivalent to night +‎ gale. Cognate with Saterland Frisian Noachtegoal (“nightingale”), Dutch nachtegaal (“nightingale”), Low German Nachtigall (“nightingale”), German Nachtigall (“nightingale”), Danish nattergal (“thrush nightingale”), Swedish näktergal (“nightingale”), Icelandic næturgali (“nightingale”).

nightingale (plural nightingales)

1. A Eurasian and African songbird, Luscinia megarhynchos, family Muscicapidae, famed for its beautiful singing at night; a common nightingale.

   Nightingales have been spotted in this coppice.

   You sing like a nightingale, sport!

   • 1769, Firishta, translated by Alexander Dow, Tales translated from the Persian of Inatulla of Delhi, volume I, Dublin: P. and W. Wilson et al., page v:

     Some admired the external beauties of the objects they beheld, like the nightingale in love with the roſe.

   • 1826, [Mary Shelley], chapter V, in The Last Man. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC:

     The oaks around were the home of a tribe of nightingales.

   • 1859, Edward Fitzgerald, The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyám: The Astronomer-Poet of Persia, page 2:

     And David's Lips are lock't; but in divine
     High piping Péhlevi, with "Wine! Wine! Wine!
     Red Wine!" — the Nightingale cries to the Rose
     That yellow Cheek of her's to'incarnadine.

   • 1936, F.J. Thwaites, chapter XXII, in The Redemption, Sydney: H. John Edwards, published 1940, page 222:

     The air, too, was heavy with perfume, and a nightingale, high in the heavens, gave out a cheery song of welcome.

• philomel

Named after Florence Nightingale.

nightingale (plural nightingales)

1. A kind of flannel scarf with sleeves, formerly worn by invalids when sitting up in bed.

• alightening

nightingale

1. Alternative form of nyghtyngale