NATURAL HISTORY · CATALOGUE RECORD
King Bird-of-paradise
Cicinnurus regius (Linnaeus, 1758)
Source-backed taxonomic record
Accepted species in Catalogue of Life’s 11 September 2026 base release. This preserves the source classification and available supporting data; it is not a completed species monograph.
Open encyclopedia reference
The king bird-of-paradise (Cicinnurus regius) is a passerine bird of the Paradisaeidae (bird-of-paradise) family. It is considered by the IOC checklist to be the only member of the genus Cicinnurus, although the genus Diphyllodes is closely related and is subsumed under Cicinnurus by many other authorities.
The king bird-of-paradise is a common and wide-ranging species, distributed throughout lowland forests of New Guinea and western satellite islands. Some populations range quite high into the hills and lower mountains, and these are poorly known as yet.
The first captive breeding of this species was by Sten Bergman of Sweden in 1958. He was awarded a commemorative medal by the Foreign Bird League to mark this achievement.
Wikipedia contributors, King bird-of-paradise; see linked history · CC BY-SA 4.0 . Plain-text lead excerpt, at most 180 words; no infobox or later sections Retrieved 2026-10-05T07:49:31.271430+00:00. This reference remains separate from the taxonomic record.
Identity & source status
- Scientific name
- Cicinnurus regius (Linnaeus, 1758)
- Name authority
- (Linnaeus, 1758)
- Common name
- King Bird-of-paradise
- Rank
- species
- Accepted status
- accepted
- Kingdom
- Animalia
- Phylum
- Chordata
- Class
- Aves
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Paradisaeidae
- Genus
- Cicinnurus
- 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.
- domainEukaryota (Chatton, 1925) Whittaker & Margulis, 1978
- kingdomAnimalia
- phylumChordata
- subphylumVertebrata
- infraphylumGnathostomata
- parvphylumOsteichthyes
- megaclassTetrapoda
- classAves
- orderPasseriformes
- familyParadisaeidae Vigors, 1825
- genusCicinnurus Vieillot, 1816
- speciesCicinnurus regius (Linnaeus, 1758)
Close classified relatives
No other member of this genus is present in the selected snapshot.
Names & synonyms
Names explicitly linked to this accepted taxon in the source. Synonymy can change with revision.
| Recorded name | Source status |
|---|---|
| Paradisaea regia Linnaeus, 1758 Linnaeus, 1758 | synonym |
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.
- https://www.itis.gov/servlet/SingleRpt/SingleRpt?search_topic=TSN&search_value=559258 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:5Z5RD. Classification follows source parent identifiers. English common names may vary by region.