Genus— 0 POPSITTA. 
Opopsitta Sclater, Proc. Zool. Soc. (Lond.) 1860, 
p. 227 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Type 0. diophthalma. 
Cyclopsitta Auctorum. Not Reichenbach, Syst. Av., tab. lxxxii., 1850. 
Also spelt — 
Cyclop8ittacus Sundevall, Meth. nat. Av. Disp. Tent., p. 69, 1872. 
Manopsitta Mathews, Austral Avian Record, Vol. II., p. 62, 
1913 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Type 0 . coxeni. 
Medium Opopsittine birds, with short bills, long wings, short tails and 
small legs and feet. 
The chief character of the Opopsittine birds seems to be the small size 
and bill characters. 
The bill is broad and deep ; the upper-mandible has the cere exposed, 
the nostrils circular, placed comparatively rather wide apart, the culmen 
being broadly ridged, not keeled ; the projecting tip is succeeded by an 
incised notch, followed by almost straight lateral edges ; the lower mandible 
is very short and broad, deeper than wide, the frontal view showing from 
none to five ridges, the tip squarely truncate. 
The wings are long with the first primary longest, the second, third and 
fourth slowly but regularly decreasing. 
The tail is short, slightly exceeding half the length of the wing ; the 
feathers are pointed, the tail wedge-shaped, the two middle feathers longest, 
and while the upper tail-coverts reach only about half the length of the tail, 
the under tail-coverts are just exceeded. The legs and feet are of the usual 
style and are small, but comparatively large when all the species of the 
family are examined. 
Salvadori, in the Catalogue of the Birds in the British Museum , Vol. XX., 
separated the Family Cyclopsittacidse with the following diagnosis : “Bill 
deeper than long, much swollen on the sides ; under-mandible with the 
gonys strongly curved and abruptly ascending towards the tip ; tongue 
unrecorded.” 
As his definition of the genus Cydopsittacus he gave : “ Bill black or 
dark horn-colour, much swollen on the sides ; gonys broadly flattened in 
front, and with several distinct ridges and grooves ; nostrils exposed, or 
hidden when the cere is feathered.” 
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