Thrush

thrush the common name of many species of bird in the genus Turdus, to which the blackbird also belongs. Best known in Britain and W. Europe are the beloved song thrush, T. philomelos, and the mistle thrush, T. viscivorus. These two were already distinguished from each other and from close relations in Anglo-Saxon times. The name ‘mavis’ (cf. French mauvis) was used more or less interchangeably with thrush by Shakespeare, as Francesca Greenoak (1979) points out; but in more recent times it refers to the song thrush in East Anglia and to the mistle thrush in parts of Scotland.