Malachite kingfisher Malachite kingfisher The malachite kingfisher ("Corythornis cristatus") is a river kingfisher which is widely distributed in Africa south of the Sahara. It is largely resident except for seasonal climate-related movements. The malachite kingfisher was described by the German naturalist Peter Simon Pallas in 1764 and given the binomial name "Alcedo cristata". The specific epithet "cristata" is from the Latin "cristatus" meaning "crested" or "plumed". The adjective "malachite" in the vernacular name normally refers to the dark green colour of the copper containing mineral. This kingfisher has blue upperparts but has black banding with pale blue or greenish-blue on its forehead.
The Malachite Box Furthermore, Pavel Bazhov indicated that his stories can be divided into two groups based on tone: "child-toned" (e.g. "The Fire-Fairy", "Silver Hoof"), and "adult-toned" ("The Stone Flower", "Marko's Hill"). Denis Zherdev divided the stories into "gold" and "malachite" series, which begin with "Beloved Name" and "The Mistress of the Copper Mountain" respectively. In the mid-1930s Sverdlovsk Publishing House decided to publish the collection "Prerevolutionary Folklore of the Urals" (). In the summer of 1934 the folklorist Vladimir Biryukov was offered to make such a collection. The historian Andrey Ladeyshchikov became its chief editor. From August to December 1935 Biryukov collected