MACAW • E-FREE TRANSLATION.COM • Definition of Macaw

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noun

Macaw n. (Zool.) Any parrot of the genus Ara, Sittace, or Macrocercus. About eighteen species are known, all of them found in Central and South America. They are large and have a very long tail, a strong hooked bill, and a naked space around the eyes. The voice is harsh, and the colors are brilliant and strongly contrasted; they are among the largest and showiest of parrots. Different species names have been given to the same macaw, as for example the Hyacinthine macaw, which has been variously classified as Anodorhyncus hyacynthinus, Anodorhyncus maximiliani, and Macrocercus hyacynthinus.

Macaw bush (Bot.), a West Indian name for a prickly kind of nightshade (Solanum mammosum).

Macaw palm, Macaw tree (Bot.), a tropical American palm (Acrocomia fusiformis and other species) having a prickly stem and pinnately divided leaves. Its nut yields a yellow butter, with the perfume of violets, which is used in making violet soap. Called also grugru palm.

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Etymology of 'Macaw'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Macaw" Quotes from Famous Books

... city with the feeling that this most complex product of civilization was nowhere else developed to such perfection. The octogenarian Londoness has been in society,—let us say the highest society,—all her days. She is as tough as an old macaw, or she would not have lasted so long. She has seen and talked with all the celebrities of three generations, all the beauties of at least half a dozen decades. Her wits have been kept bright by constant ...

— Our Hundred Days in Europe • Oliver Wendell Holmes

... furious half-naked men, the fat bare back of a Burman, tattooed from collar-bone to waist-cloth with writhing patterns of red and blue devils, holds the eye first. It is a wicked back. Beyond it is the flicker of a Malay kris. A blue, red, and yellow macaw chained to a stanchion spreads his wings against the sun in an ecstasy of terror. Half-a-dozen red-gold pines and bananas have been knocked down from their ripening-places, and are lying between the feet of the fighters. ...

— Letters of Travel (1892-1913) • Rudyard Kipling

... of a native of Guiana, we figure to ourselves a man whose head and waist are decorated with the fine feathers of the macaw, the toucan, and the humming-bird. Our painters and sculptors have long since regarded these ornaments as the characteristic marks of an American. We were surprised at not finding in the Chayma Missions, in the encampments of Uruana and of Pararuma ...

— Equinoctial Regions of America V2 • Alexander von Humboldt

... learned to understand is that when a dog wags his tail he means 'I'm glad!'—It's funny, isn't it? You are the very first man to talk like us. Oh, sometimes people annoy me dreadfully—such airs they put on—talking about 'the dumb animals.' DUMB!—Huh! Why I knew a macaw once who could say 'Good morning!' in seven different ways without once opening his mouth. He could talk every language—and Greek. An old professor with a gray beard bought him. But he didn't stay. He said the old man didn't talk Greek right, and he couldn't ...

— The Story of Doctor Dolittle • Hugh Lofting

Words linked to "Macaw" : genus Ara, Ara