nightingale
noun
Simple meaning
A small bird known for its beautiful song, often heard at night.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
nytihnggaylSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈnaɪtɪŋɡeɪl
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
A Eurasian and African songbird, Luscinia megarhynchos, family Muscicapidae, famed for its beautiful singing at night; a common nightingale.
European songbird noted for its melodious nocturnal song
A kind of flannel scarf with sleeves, formerly worn by invalids when sitting up in bed.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A Eurasian and African songbird, Luscinia megarhynchos, family Muscicapidae, famed for its beautiful singing at night; a common nightingale.
Used this way, nightingale is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly warm, approving pull. It turns up most in family or home contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Positive
- Formality
- Slightly formal
- Intensity
- Moderate
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Beautiful or graceful
- Usage feel
- Reflective and slightly elevated
Where it naturally appears
- Family/home
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.