''Heliothryx'' is a genus of

hummingbird Hummingbirds are birds native to the Americas and comprise the biological family Trochilidae. With about 361 species and 113 genera, they occur from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, but the vast majority of the species are found in the tropics aro ...

in the family Trochilidae. The genus is assigned to the subfamily Polytminae which is sometimes referred to by the informal name "mangoes".

Taxonomy

The genus ''Heliothryx'' was introduced in 1831 by the German zoologist Friedrich Boie. Boie did not specify the

type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specimen ...

but this was designated as the

black-eared fairy The black-eared fairy (''Heliothryx auritus'') is a species of hummingbird in the subfamily Polytminae, the mangoes. It is found in every mainland South American country except Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, and Uruguay. Taxonomy The black-eared ...

by George Robert Gray in 1840. The genus name combines the

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

''hēlios'' meaning "sun" with ''thrix'' meaning "hair". The genus contains the following two species:

References

Taxonomy articles created by Polbot {{hummingbird-stub