Hylocichla
hy-loh-SIK-luh
Genus
thrush of the woods
Literally: wood-thrush
| Part | Meaning | Language | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| hylo- | wood, woods | Greek (hyl, =a, -o) | combining form hylo-, from Greek hylē |
| -cichla | a thrush | Greek (cichl, =a) | terminal form -cichla (=a ending); the genus name is feminine, following the grammatical gender of cichla |
A single compound Greek noun formed from the combining form hylo- (wood) + cichla (thrush), used as a feminine genus name treated as Latin. There is no species epithet; Hylocichla stands alone as a genus-level name.
Pronunciation
- hy-loh-SIK-luh Antepenult stress: the penult vowel 'i' is short and followed by only one consonant before the final vowel, so stress falls on the antepenult 'cich' — but the word has four syllables: hy-lo-cich-la; the antepenult is 'cich', which carries the stress. Penult 'la' is final -a = short 'uh'. The antepenult vowel 'i' is short (single consonant on each side). ch = hard 'k'.
Other readings
The connecting vowel -o- is the standard Greek combining vowel; no alternative segmentation is plausible.
The Latin root 'loc' flagged by the position-based matcher (positions 2–5) is a false positive — those letters appear inside 'Hylo-' and do not form a real segment here. The correct segmentation is entirely Greek: hylo- + cichla. Hylocichla is the genus of the Wood Thrush (Hylocichla mustelina) and related North American thrushes. ch in Greek-derived scientific names is pronounced as hard 'k', giving SIK not SICH.