noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   Any of various insectivorous ground-feeding birds, mainly of the genus Phoenicurus. Many of the species have a red tail.
2. 2
   European songbird with a reddish breast and tail; related to Old World robins wordnet
3. 3
   A species of warbler native to the Americas, Setophaga ruticilla, only distantly related to Phoenicurus. Canada, US
4. 4
   flycatching warbler of eastern North America the male having bright orange on sides and wings and tail wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

american redstartamerican redstartmagpieredtailsetophaga ruticilla

Etymology

Inherited from Middle English *redstert; equivalent to red + start (“tail”). Compare Dutch roodstaart, Danish rødstjert.

Related phrases

American redstartDaurian redstartEversmann's redstartGüldenstädt's redstartHodgson's redstartLuzon water redstartMoussier's redstartPrzevalski's redstartblack redstartblue-capped redstartblue-fronted redstartcommon redstart

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