A diminutive bird of the parrot tribe, esp. the West African Lovebird, Agapornis pullarius, remarkable for the affection it shows for its mate. The name is also given to the other species of the genus Agapornis; to several American species of Psittacula; and to certain small Australian Parrakeets, esp. Euphema undulata.
1595. Lyly, Woman in Moon, V. i. 105. Ile giue thee … Loue birdes whose feathers shalbe beaten gold.
1841. Penny Cycl., XIX. 92/2. The latter [Agapornis], a ready example of which occurs in the Lovebirds,… was separated from Psittacula.
1860–1. Thackeray, Lovel, iv. (1869), 214. Unless they are two behind a carriage-perch they pine away, I suppose,… as one love-bird does without his mate.
1886. Miss Braddon, Fatal Three, I. ii. A pair of Virginian love-birds were twittering in their gilded cage.
1897. Blackmore, Dariel, xviii. 179. A pair of what are called ‘lovebirds,’ of whom, if one hops the final twig, the other pines into the darkness and dies.
