a brownish European songbird, Luscinia megarhynchos, with a broad reddish-brown tail: well known for its musical song, usually heard at night
any of various similar or related birds, such as Luscinia luscinia ( thrush nightingale )
1200–50; Middle English nightyngale, nasalized variant of nightegale, Old English nihtegale, cognate with German Nachtigall, literally, night singer (compare Old English galan sing; akin to yell )
A nightingale is a very small bird with a beautiful, loud song. If you hear the distinctive whistles of the nightingale, it is most likely a male bird seeking a mate. Nightingales got their name because of the unattached male's habit of singing long into the night (although nightingales also sing during the day). Its song is distinctive and powerful, with trills, whistles, and gurgling sounds punctuating it. The nightingale has inspired writers of all sorts throughout history, including ancient Greeks, the poet Chaucer, and T.S. Eliot in "The Waste Land." The name nightingale combines night with the Proto-Germanic galon, "to sing."
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Just as the familiar tune “In the Hall of the Mountain King” gradually builds speed “accelerando,” as the compositional notation is known, some birdsong does too, like that of the nightingale.
From New York Times ● Jun. 6, 2023
I wonder if even Janet Malcolm might have given a pass to this devoted biographer and his own bow to a nightingale.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 3, 2023
It was on Hampstead Heath that John Keats pondered the beauty of nature, nightingale song and mortality.
From BBC ● Jul. 1, 2021
Animals have always come and gone, medieval wolves, later Keats’ nightingale, later still a rare wallaby, spotted bounding through the trees in spring 2019.
From The Guardian ● Mar. 5, 2020
From somewhere up above, a nightingale sings a beautiful song to me.
From "Across So Many Seas" by Ruth Behar
Sydney Von Arx is chief executive of Nightingale Collective, the not-for-profit organization whose data inspired the September swarm-chasing spree.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 2, 2026
Nightingale says it has now cataloged about 19,000 messages from the agents.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 2, 2026
The statue is located just off the Mall and is near the statue of Florence Nightingale and Crimean War Memorial.
From BBC ● Sep. 28, 2026
On Sept. 4, researchers at another not-for-profit group, the Nightingale Collective, found that OpenAI agents undergoing testing had hijacked a German website to communicate.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 14, 2026
Albert Nightingale took off a glove, and Joseph flinched, thinking he was going to slap him with it, but he placed his cool palm against Joseph’s burning forehead.
From "The Marvels" by Brian Selznick
This will be beneficial for a host of wildlife and rare species, including nightingales.
From BBC ● Dec. 14, 2025
Yet prior to the new study, only humans and thrush nightingales have been observed singing songs that have a rhythmical structure—that is, containing features such as a “categorical rhythm.”
From Science Magazine ● Oct. 25, 2021
Knepp boasts the largest population in Britain of the Purple Emperor butterfly; nightingales, after years of decline, are nesting there in rising numbers.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 3, 2019
Ornithologists kept finding that birds that rely on insects for food were in trouble: eight in 10 partridges gone from French farmlands; 50 and 80 percent drops, respectively, for nightingales and turtledoves.
From New York Times ● Nov. 27, 2018
From there you can see the golden hills of Toledo and hear the nightingales sing.
From "Across So Many Seas" by Ruth Behar
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