Re: [dinosaur] Xunmenglong, new compsognathid theropod from Lower Cretaceous of China

["David Marjanovic" <david.marjanovic@gmx.at>]

> Also _Pinguinus_: the great auk, not penguins. This one goes back over 200 
> years, and the origin seems innocent enough. One hypothesis is that the 
> great auk (now extinct) was the first bird to be called a pingin/penguin, and 
> the word was only later applied to the birds we now call penguins.

That's not a hypothesis, that's an observed fact: the great auk is called 
pingouin in French, where the penguins are called manchot.

In Welsh, Cornish and Breton, pen gwynn (and variants) literally means "white 
head" and was applied to one of the capes the great auks covered in guano.