Garrulacinae 3

The distribution of the Garrulacinae in East Asia can be found at Tzung-Su Ding's Distribution of Garrulacinae in East Asia.

The Garrulacinae provide an interesting example of the way in which Japanese bird names have entered Chinese.

Liocichla steerii (Steere's liochchla) is found only in Taiwan. It can be assumed that it was given the name ヤブドリ yabu-dori by Japanese ornithologists when Japan controlled Taiwan (the bird itself was discovered in 1873 by Professor J. B. Steere of the University of Michigan). The Japanese name is written 薮鳥. This name gives the appearance of having been taken over in written form by the Chinese, i.e., borrowed in the form of Chinese characters (藪鳥) with the Chinese pronunciation sǒu-niǎo.

The Japanese word 薮 yabu and the Chinese word 藪/薮 sǒu have somewhat different meanings. In Japanese 薮 yabu is a relatively common word for 'a thicket or scrub with bushes, grass, and bamboo'. The Chinese word 藪 sǒu is not an everyday word. It is a formal word meaning 'a shallow lake overgrown with wild plants'. Since the liocichlas live in high forests, not lakes, it seems that the Japanese meaning was indeed the intended one.

In Mainland China, the word 藪鳥 sǒu-niǎo has undergone further changes. It has been extended to cover all liocichlas and the name itself has been modified to 薮鹛 sǒu-méi, literally 'marsh babbler'. This is part of the regularisation of the names of the babblers and laughing thrushes in order to indicate clearly that they belong to the laughing thrushes (For an interesting example of this phenomenon, see the note concerning the wren babblers).