A large sea eagle with a light-colored head and powerful hunting abilities, found in northern regions and revered in mythology and heraldry.
From Old English 'earn,' related to Old Norse 'ørn' and German 'Adler'; the word is ancient and appears in Germanic and Norse languages, with the bird itself symbolizing power across cultures.
The erne is Scotland's and Ireland's national bird, and it nearly went extinct in Britain before being reintroduced—it's a powerful symbol that represents wilderness, but for centuries it only existed in poems and heraldry because we killed them all.
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