Quetzal ("Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary"), from the Nahuatl root = "stand up" used to refer to an upstanding plume of feathers. The word entered English through Spanish. The word "quetzal" was originally used for just the resplendent quetzal, the long-tailed quetzal of Guatemala, (more specifically a town called Petén) which is the national bird and the name of the currency of Guatemala. It still often refers to that bird specifically but now also names all the species of the genera "Pharomachrus" and "Euptilotis". "Pharomachrus" is from Ancient Greek , "mantle", and , "long", referring to the wing and tail coverts of the
Resplendent quetzal country's currency, the Guatemalan quetzal (abbreviation GTQ). The resplendent quetzal was first described by Mexican naturalist Pablo de La Llave in 1832. It is one of five species of the genus "Pharomachrus" known as quetzals. The term "quetzal" was originally used for just this species, but is now applied to all members of the genera "Pharomachrus" and "Euptilotis". Two subspecies are recognised, "P. m. mocinno" and "P. m. costaricensis". The epithet "mocinno" is Llave's Latinization of the name of the biologist J. M. Mociño, a mentor of his. (It is sometimes spelled "mocino", but "ñ" was formerly spelled "nn" in