noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   A little bird; especially, a baby bird.

   "Near-synonyms: birdlet, birdie, birb; chick, nestling, fledgling"

2. 2
   Turtle. rare

Synonyms

All synonyms

;birbbirdiebirdletcalfchick

Example

More examples

"Near-synonyms: birdlet, birdie, birb; chick, nestling, fledgling"

Etymology

Etymology 1

From bird + -ling.

Etymology 2

From Old English byrdling, from Proto-Germanic *burdilingaz. By surface analysis, bord + -ling.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.