NUMEXIUS. 237 



Genus NUMENIUS Brisson, Orn. v. 1760, p. 311. 

 Type : N. arquata (Linn.)- 



Numenzus=vovprivios, a kind of Curlew in Diogenes Laertius, ix. 144 ; from 

 veos = new, and \ir\vr\ the moon, from its crescent-shaped beak. 



Numenius arquata. CURLEW. 



Scolopax arquata Linnaws, Syst. Nat. 1758, p. 145 : 

 Sweden. 



Numenius arquata (Linn.) ; B. O. Z7. List, 1st ed. 1883, p. 179 ; 

 Sharpe, Cat. Birds B. M. xxiv. 1896, p. 341 ; Sounders, 

 Manual, 2nd ed. 1899, p. 627. 



Arquuta, the mediaeval name. It is generally said (e. g. by Gesner, H. A. 

 lib. iii. p. 196, ed. 1617) to be derived from the bird's bill being bent like a 

 bow, arcus ; but it more likely refers to arquatus morbus = the jaundice 

 " when the skin turns to the yellow colour of the rainbow " in allusion to the 

 legend about Charadrius, Galbula, Icterus, etc. 



Distribution in the British Islands. A Resident ; also a 

 Bird of Passage hi spring and autumn and a Winter Visitor 

 to our coasts. In spring, breeding-birds retire inland to 

 nest, returning to the coast in early autumn, and are found 

 sparingly on the moors of the south-western counties from 

 Hampshire and Wiltshire to Cornwall, and occasionally in 

 Norfolk and Surrey. In Wales and in the neighbouring 

 counties and on the high ground northwards, throughout 

 Scotland and the Orkney and Shetland Islands and in 

 Ireland, it breeds freely, but apparently not in the Outer 

 Hebrides. 



General Distribution. The Curlew breeds in northern and 

 central Europe and in southern Siberia, from Scandinavia 

 eastwards to the valley of the Obi, north to the Arctic Circle, 

 thence across Siberia to Transbaikalia ; southwards it ranges 

 to Brittany, Germany, Poland, Austria, south Russia, 

 and the Kirghiz Steppes. It is said to have bred in the 

 eastern Canary Islands. In winter it visits the Mediter- 

 ranean basin and Africa, south to the Cape and Madagascar: 



