n. A male falcon or hawk, especially a peregrine falcon or gyrfalcon. [Middle English, from Old French terçuel, from Vulgar Latin *tertiōlus, diminutive of Latin tertius, third (perhaps because the third egg in every clutch was thought to hatch into a male, or because male hawks were said to be a third smaller than females); see trei- in the Appendix of Indo-European roots.] |
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