- any of various totipalmate swimming birds of the family Anhingidae, having a very long and flexible neck.
Origin of anhinga
1760–70; < Portuguese < Tupi ayingá
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for anhinga
The flesh of the anhinga is not valuable, as it is hard and tough.
He says he found a peculiar parasite in the brain of the Anhinga.
Ripley reports the occurrence of "about a dozen anhingas (presumably Anhinga melanogaster)" at Babelthuap on 12 November 1946.The Avifauna of Micronesia, Volume 3
Rollin H. Baker
It was an anhinga, one of the most singular specimens of web-footed birds that can be found anywhere.
The latter, I must confess, did not seem to us so nice as the dark-colored meat of the anhinga.
- another name for darter (def. 1)
C18: via Portuguese from Tupi
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for anhinga
American fishing bird (also called the snake-bird), 1769, from a Tupi word which sometimes is said to mean "snake-bird."
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper