Partrich

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. An old or dialect spelling of a plump game bird with brown plumage that is hunted for sport and food
2. A variant form of the name of a stocky wild bird, often found in fields and shot as game
3. An archaic way of writing the name of a small round-bodied game bird that nests on the ground

Etymology: "Partrich" is an older spelling of "partridge," and the bird's Greek name is the most striking part of its history. In Greek myth, Perdix was the nephew of the inventor Daedalus, who grew jealous of his talent and tried to kill him by pushing him from the Acropolis. The goddess Athena caught him in mid-fall and turned him into a bird, which Ovid tells in the "Metamorphoses." The Greek word for the bird, "perdix," is the source of the English name. The word passed into Old French as "perdriz" and then into English in Middle English spellings such as "partrich," which the modern form gradually replaced. The Greek root is probably imitative of the bird's whirring flight or call, though its exact origin is uncertain.

Synonyms: partridge