Word.ws English Dictionary

Proavis

Proavis noun: any of various hypothetical extinct species or taxa that were coined in the early 20th century in an attempt to support and explain the hypothetical evolutionary steps and anatomical adaptations leading from non-avian theropod dinosaurs to birds.

Noun

Proavis (plural Proaves)

  1. Any of various hypothetical extinct species or taxa that were coined in the early 20th century in an attempt to support and explain the hypothetical evolutionary steps and anatomical adaptations leading from non-avian theropod dinosaurs to birds.

Forms of Proavis

pluralProaves
alternative formPro-Avis

Origin of Proavis

From pro- (“prior”) + Latin avis (“bird”)

Questions about Proavis

What does Proavis mean?
Proavis means any of various hypothetical extinct species or taxa that were coined in the early 20th century in an attempt to support and explain the hypothetical evolutionary steps and anatomical adaptations leading from non-avian theropod dinosaurs to birds.
What part of speech is Proavis?
Proavis is a noun.
What is the plural of Proavis?
The plural of Proavis is Proaves.

Words near Proavis in the dictionary

  1. proaversive
  2. Proaves
  3. proavian
  4. proavians
  5. proaviation
  6. Proavis
  7. proazaphosphatrane
  8. proazaphosphatranes
  9. prob
  10. prob'ly
  11. prob.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: Proavis (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “Proavis.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/proavis. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.