Purple-throated Cotinga

Open encyclopedia reference

The purple-throated cotinga (Porphyrolaema porphyrolaema) is a species of bird in the cotinga family, Cotingidae. It is found in the western Amazon rainforest of South America; its range extends from southern Colombia south through eastern Ecuador and Peru and east through extreme northwestern Bolivia and into western Amazonian Brazil. It lives in the canopy or along the borders of humid forest throughout its range. The purple-throated cotinga is monotypic within the genus Porphyrolaema and has no known subspecies. It is one of the smaller cotinga species and expresses strong sexual dimorphism. Males have black upperparts with a bold white wingstripe and white edges to the tertial feathers and a white belly with some black barring on the rear flanks. The throat is a deep purple, giving the bird both its common and scientific names. Females are dark brown with pale buffy margins on the upperparts, buffy cinnamon with black barring on the underparts, and rufous on the throat. The male has a powerful voice.

Wikipedia contributors, Purple-throated cotinga; see linked history · CC BY-SA 4.0 . Plain-text lead excerpt, at most 180 words; no infobox or later sections Retrieved 2026-10-05T07:58:13.259339+00:00. This reference remains separate from the taxonomic record.

Identity & source status

Scientific name

Porphyrolaema porphyrolaema (Deville & P. L. Sclater, 1852)

Name authority

(Deville & P. L. Sclater, 1852)

Common name

Purple-throated Cotinga

Rank

species

Accepted status

accepted

Kingdom

Animalia

Phylum

Chordata

Class

Aves

Order

Passeriformes

Family

Cotingidae

Genus

Porphyrolaema

Extinction status

Recorded extant

Classification family tree

Nested taxonomic groups from the source. This is not a direct-ancestor chain, a dated evolutionary tree or a phylogenetic reconstruction.

1. domainEukaryota (Chatton, 1925) Whittaker & Margulis, 1978
2. kingdomAnimalia
3. phylumChordata
4. subphylumVertebrata
5. infraphylumGnathostomata
6. parvphylumOsteichthyes
7. megaclassTetrapoda
8. classAves
9. orderPasseriformes
10. familyCotingidae
11. genusPorphyrolaema Bonaparte, 1854
12. speciesPorphyrolaema porphyrolaema (Deville & P. L. Sclater, 1852)

Close classified relatives

No other member of this genus is present in the selected snapshot.

Browse 38 records assigned to Cotingidae.

Names & synonyms

Names explicitly linked to this accepted taxon in the source. Synonymy can change with revision.

Documented distribution

Source distribution statements, not a complete range map. A listed locality is not necessarily a place of origin.

Source literature & publication evidence

References attached to this source record, including nomenclatural citations where supplied. This is a selected bibliography; abbreviated citations remain in the source’s form.

1. https://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=562425 Source fields: Taxon.tsv dwc:namePublishedIn, Taxon.tsv dcterms:references

Origins, evidence & remaining research

Name authority and publication references document nomenclature where the source supplies it. They do not establish evolutionary origins or the earliest fossil occurrence.

Specimen-level evidence, morphology, ecological research, phylogenetic studies, a comprehensive bibliography and a located literary passage have not yet been compiled for this record. A suitable sourced image remains to be added.

Dataset citation & attribution

This exact taxon in ChecklistBank · Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11

Catalogue of Life 2026-09-11; dataset 316321; doi:10.48580/dgz5n. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ . Retrieved 5 October 2026.

Stable key: col:4LZ78. Classification follows source parent identifiers. English common names may vary by region.