The word Luscinia was used for nightingales and similar birds in Classical Latin (e.g. in the AD 70s Naturalis Historia by Pliny the Elder), if not earlier. Etymologically, it might be derived from luscus (Latin for "half-blind", "half-understood" etc.) or clueō (Latin for "to be well-known") + (probably) Latin canō "to sing". Hence, it could be translated as "little-seen [as in the twilight] songster" or "famous songster".[1] The genus Luscinia was introduced by the English naturalist Thomas Forster in 1817.