The kanji spelling literally means “time bird”, as the lesser cuckoo's timely arrival in early summer can be used as a metaphor for new life detaching from the past.[1]
See also 時つ鳥 (tokitsudori) and 時の鳥 (toki no tori).
For pronunciation and definitions of 時鳥 – see the following entry.
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(This term, 時鳥, is an alternative spelling of the above term.)
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- ^ Daniel Gallimore (2019) “Of Ponds, Lakes, and the Sea: Shōyō, Shakespeare, and Romanticism”, in Alex Watson, Laurence Williams, editors, British Romanticism in Asia: The Reception, Translation, and Transformation of Romantic Literature in India and East Asia (Asia-Pacific and Literature in English), Springer, →ISBN, page 281