A large ground-dwelling bird from Central and South America, related to the curassow and chachalaca, with dark plumage and sometimes ornamental head crests.
From Portuguese 'araçari' or Spanish colonial terms for tropical game birds, blended with indigenous American bird names, the spelling influenced by French 'carassou.'
The carassow was so important to pre-Columbian diets that when Europeans arrived, they borrowed the indigenous name directly—and the word traveled back to Europe in trade documents about exotic foods.
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