Why Is It Called an Albatross? The Surprising History of Bird Names

Why do birds have the names they do?

In this episode of Wildly Curious, Katy Reiss kicks off a new mini-series called “Bird Name Game”, exploring the fascinating origins behind bird names. Each episode looks at two birds, their natural history, and the surprising linguistic stories behind what we call them.

This episode dives into two iconic seabirds: the albatross and the gull.

The albatross, one of the largest flying birds on Earth, can glide across the ocean for thousands of miles with barely a wingbeat. But its name didn’t start in English. It traveled through Arabic, Portuguese, Spanish, and Latin, changing spelling and even switching which bird it referred to before becoming the name we know today.

Gulls, on the other hand, have a much simpler origin. Their name likely comes from ancient Celtic and Norse roots that imitate the bird’s loud, wailing call—the same cry that echoes across beaches, harbors, and parking lots everywhere.

Along the way, we explore:

• How albatrosses travel thousands of miles using ocean winds
• Why many albatross species form lifelong partnerships
• The surprising linguistic journey from “alcatraz” to “albatross”
• Why gulls were named after the sound they make
• How bird names reflect human language, culture, and first impressions

If you love birding, natural history, ornithology, or wildlife science, this mini-series reveals how the names of birds tell stories about exploration, language, and the people who first encountered them.

Subscribe for more episodes of Wildly Curious, where science, nature, and curiosity collide.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:42

We didn't forget about you. We didn't ghost you. Life, as always, just gets in the way. So we are now taking a season break, letting Laura and I regroup, and then we'll be bringing more episodes back to you. So this is gonna be the season's breaks like we normally do. And we're gonna do four quick episodes in between here. That way Laura and I can prep for writing scripts for the new season, and then we'll be back. So it is just gonna be me today, and we're gonna be doing this mini-series on the bird name game. Okay, sounds way more fun than what I'm about to describe to you. If you guys follow me on Instagram or anything at WildlyKatie, you'll see it's all about birds and birding and stuff. Each mini episode is gonna be talking about two birds that Laura and I each think are at least related for some reason. All right. And then we're gonna give you a little natural history and then why they're named what they're named. Because some of this is pretty interesting, right? I mean, you call a robin a robin, a cardinal, a cardinal, but you don't really know why. So we're gonna kind of dive into all that. So today's the first episode. Again, these are gonna be quick mini episodes. So brace yourselves, hold on to your boots, hold on to your overalls, whatever you're wearing right now. And the first episode is gonna be albatross and galls. One bird I love, one bird I hate. One bird I have a tattoo of, one bird I don't. I'll let you guess which one I have a tattoo of. Let's start with one of the more famous seabirds on earth, the albatross. Albatrosses are giants of the open ocean. These are remarkably large birds. There's about 15 different species, and some of them have wingspans that can stretch more than 11 feet across. Which is insane. Like that's a huge freaking bird. So these birds spend most of their lives far out at sea, gliding over waves for hours, sometimes days, without even flapping their wings. They ride ocean winds so efficiently that scientists have tracked albatross traveling thousands of miles on a single trip, which is insane. I don't even have the patience for that in a plane, and I'm not really doing any work for that. They're also famously loyal partners. Many albatross bond for life, meeting up at the same remote nesting islands year after year. But the word albatross has a surprisingly tangled history. So the name made its way into English through Portuguese sailors who use the word Alcatraz for large seabirds, especially pelicans. So this one blew my mind because at first I was like Alcatraz, like the jail, and then a whiplash of wait, pelicans? And and I g I don't know. Again, I said this in an interview with somebody recently that I think a lot of people look at birds like dogs, right? There's your dogs, and dogs are dogs, even though there's different breeds, dogs are still dogs. Birds are very much so not that way, right? Birds from one species to another are extremely, extremely different. So when I look at an albatross versus a pelican, I mean, yeah, a big bird, I don't know. Pelicans are just so much chunkier. I don't know. The beak is all off, but I mean, I could see if you're just like, what the heck is that big flying bird? Okay, we'll give it to him. So the word itself came from Arabic Algataz, which means the diver. So that makes sense for both pelicans and albatross, but not the confusing look. Anyway, before long, the name bounced around several languages and spellings Alcatraz, Al Gatros, Albatros, with an I, and eventually settled onto the word we know today albatross. At some point along the way, the spelling may have also been influenced by the Latin word albus, meaning white, since many albatrosses are pale compared to other seabirds like the frigate birds. The word bounced around, like the word itself, albatross, bounced across Arabic, Portuguese, Spanish, and English, changed its spelling several times, and even switched which bird it's referring to before finally landing on the giant ocean wanderers we call albatross today, which honestly does feel appropriate for a bird that spends its entire life traveling the open seas. The second bird we're gonna talk about today, real quick, is the galls. Okay, I'll give you, I'll just tell you the answer. This is not the bird I have tattooed on me, nor would I ever get this freaking bird tattooed on me. I have an albatross on my back. Anyway, there are on 50 species of god deer god. There are about there are about 50 species of galls. Sweet mother pearl. And if you've ever spent time near the ocean, or let's be real, like a parking lot near your house, anywhere in the US almost, you've probably encountered one. Galls are definitely opportunistic. They'll eat fish, insects, crabs, and yes, you've heard Laura and I speak before that they'll freaking take your French fries. If you walk three miles on the beach to get them and you're not paying attention, whoop, they're gone because they're very opportunistic. But their name is much simpler than the albatross. The word gall likely comes from very old Celtic and Norse route, which let's be real, that makes this bird sound way cooler than they actually are, but it seems to be directly tied to the sound that these birds are actually making. That loud wailing, slightly complaining cry you hear echoing over beaches and harbors. In old English, galls were sometimes called mouths, a word derived from Old Norse term that mimic their mewing calls. Over time, versions of the name appeared across several languages, all echoing the same sound. Words like gullen, gylin, and gwelen. Basically, people were listening to these birds cry overhead, saying, Yep, that noise, that's the name. The word gall shows up written in English as early as the 1400s, even appearing in an old cookbook, which somewhat anonymously mentions that even the fishy gall was eaten. I mean, I wouldn't I I hate galls, but I wouldn't I wouldn't eat it. I can't, I don't know. Today, the name is stuck, and it still carries the echo of the gall's unmistakable voice. So that was today's quick round of the bird name game. It gave us two, you know, very different naming stories. One bird, the albatross, picked up its name that wandered through multiple languages and even changed which bird it was referring to along the way, which makes sense from all the different languages, all the way the bird traveled, long name lineage, long way to travel. And the other, the gall got its name, basically came straight from the sound it makes while shouting over the winds, waves, and stealing your French fries. Which goes to show that birds' names don't just tell us about the birds themselves, they tell us about the people, the languages, and sometimes the very first impressions that those birds make when on anybody when they're overheard. Alright, so that wraps up the first episode of the bird name game. Make sure you guys follow us on YouTube, especially, and subscribe so that way you can see the updates whenever we are actually uploading episodes. And then again, we're gonna do four of these episodes and then we're gonna hit the new season. So talk to you guys. Well, actually, I won't talk to you guys next week. Laura will talk to you guys next week.