Forms: 7 algatross, 7–8 albi-, 8 albe-, 8– albatross. [Apparently a modification of ALCATRAS, applied to the Frigate-bird, but extended through inaccurate knowledge to a still larger sea-fowl, and in this sense altered to albi-, albe-, albatross (perhaps with etymological reference to albus white, the albatross being white, while the alcatras was black). Algatross in 16th c. may be an intermediate form; albatross has not been found bef. 1769. The word has now passed into most of the mod. langs. (Du. albatross, G. -tross, -tros, Fr. -tros, It. -tro, Pg. -troz, Sp. -troste), but seems to have originated in Eng. (or ? Du.)]
† 1. The Frigate-bird, = ALCATRAS 2. Obs.
1732. Mortimer, in Phil. Trans., XXXVII. 448. While the Albitrosse are setting and hatching their Young, their Heads change from Brown to Scarlet, and become Brown again afterwards.
1748. Anson, Voy., I. vi. (ed. 4), 76. Their bills are narrow, like that of an Albitross.
1753. Chambers, Cycl. Supp., Albitrosse, the name of a large sea-bird, common about Jamaica, and in many other places. This is a thievish creature and principally feeds on the prey which another sea-bird, called the booby, provides for itself.
2. The English name of a family of birds allied to the Petrels (Order Tubinares), which inhabit the Pacific and Southern Oceans. The great Albatross, Diomedea exulans, to which the name is usually applied, is the largest of sea-fowls.
1681. Grew, Mus. Reg. Soc., 73. The Head of the Man of War; called also Albitrosse. [Figured; clearly Diomedea.]
1697. Dampier, Voy., an. 1691 (1703), I. 531. They [sailors] have several other signes, whereby to know when they are near it, by the sea-fowl they meet at sea, especially the Algatrosses, a very large long-winged fowl.
1698. Fryer, Acc. E. India & P., 12. Those feathered Harbingers of the Cape … Albetrosses.
1719. Shelvocke, Voy., in Harris I. 202. These were accompanied with Albitrosses, the largest sort of sea-fowls.
1768. (Dec. 24) Cook, Voy. (1790), I. 30. We shot an albetross, which measured between the tips of its wings nine feet and an inch. Ibid. (1769), (Jan. 26) The Albatrosses proved very good eating.
1798. Coleridge, Anc. Mar., II. xiv. Instead of the cross, the albatross About my neck was hung.
1845. Darwin, Voy. Nat., viii. (1879), 162. It has always been a mystery to me on what the albatross … can subsist.
1865. Lubbock, Preh. Times, 367. Ear-rings made of albatross-down.
