Taxonomy
The Resplendent Quetzal was first described by Mexican naturalist Pablo de La Llave in 1832. It is one of five species of the genus Pharomachrus known as quetzals. The term "quetzal" was originally used for just this species, but is now applied to all members of the genera Pharomachrus and Euptilotis.
Two subspecies are recognised, P. m. mocinno and P. m. costaricensis. The epithet mocinno is Llave's Latinization of the name of the biologist J. M. Mociño, a mentor of his. (It is sometimes spelled mocino, but "ñ" was formerly spelled "nn" in Spanish, so the spelling with "nn" is justified and in any case now official., )
The word "quetzal" came from Nahuatl (Aztec), where quetzalli (from the root quetz = "stand") meant "tall upstanding plume" and then "quetzal tail feather"; from that Nahuatl quetzaltotōtl means "quetzal-feather bird" and thus "quetzal".
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