But for some reason I just tried looking up words for animals that happen to have an emoji. I used mostly Nature and the Environment in Early Buddhism by S. Dhammika and the PTS. I tried to infer which of multiple possible translations was the most “default” but in some cases it was mostly just a more or less random choice. (Gharials or marsh crocodiles for … hmm…)
Anyway, if anyone else finds this interesting, additions, corrections, and comments welcome of course.
As the Didus ineptus belongs in the pigeon family and gets its popular name from an obsolete form of the Portuguese word for a simpleton, I suggest mūḷhakapota (“silly pigeon”) for the male and either mūḷhakapotī or mūḷhakapotikā for the female.
Alternatively, just import the word: doda and dodī / dodikā.
Haha! That is great. I tried to filter out the most unlikely ones (llama, panda, chipmunk, skunk…) but I missed the dodos.
Actually your suggestion does bring up the interesting topic of what happened to borrowed words in Pali. Do we know of any borrowings from languages besides Sanskrit or various flavors of Prakrit?
Thomas Burrow published several surveys of alleged Dravidian loanwords in Vedic, Classical Sanskrit and various Prakrits, including Pali. I’m afraid I haven’t myself read any of his papers, so I can’t give you any examples.
I don’t believe there’s an emoji for vulture yet? There isn’t one for squirrels, either, which as an avowed squirrel admirer is a source of dukkha for me, but perhaps let’s enlist the chipmunk emoji as kalandaka.
Draconic creatures appear in virtually all cultures around the globe. Nonetheless, scholars dispute where the idea of a dragon originates from and a wide variety of hypotheses have been proposed.
In his book An Instinct for Dragons (2000), anthropologistDavid E. Jones suggests a hypothesis that humans, like monkeys, have inherited instinctive reactions to snakes, large cats, and birds of prey. He cites a study which found that approximately 39 people in a hundred are afraid of snakes and notes that fear of snakes is especially prominent in children, even in areas where snakes are rare. The earliest attested dragons all resemble snakes or have snakelike attributes. Jones therefore concludes that dragons appear in nearly all cultures because humans have an innate fear of snakes and other animals that were major predators of humans’ primate ancestors. Dragons are usually said to reside in “dank caves, deep pools, wild mountain reaches, sea bottoms, haunted forests”, all places which would have been fraught with danger for early human ancestors.
In her book The First Fossil Hunters: Dinosaurs, Mammoths, and Myth in Greek and Roman Times (2000), Adrienne Mayor argues that some stories of dragons may have been inspired by ancient discoveries of fossils belonging to dinosaurs and other prehistoric animals. She argues that the dragon lore of northern India may have been inspired by “observations of oversized, extraordinary bones in the fossilbeds of the Siwalik Hills below the Himalayas” and that ancient Greek artistic depictions of the Monster of Troy may have been influenced by fossils of Samotherium, an extinct species of giraffe whose fossils are common in the Mediterranean region. In China, a region where fossils of large prehistoric animals are common, these remains are frequently identified as “dragon bones” and are commonly used in Chinese traditional medicine. Mayor, however, is careful to point out that not all stories of dragons and giants are inspired by fossils and notes that Scandinavia has many stories of dragons and sea monsters, but has long “been considered barren of large fossils.” In one of her later books, she states that “Many dragon images around the world were based on folk knowledge or exaggerations of living reptiles, such as Komodo dragons, Gila monsters, iguanas, alligators, or, in California, alligator lizards.”
… hmm…)
ant: pipīlikā
bat: vagguli
bear: accha
beetle:
bird: sakuṇa
blowfish:
boar: varāha
bug: maṅkuna
butterfly:
camel: oṭṭha
cat: biḷāla
chicken: kukkuṭa
cockroach:
cow: go
cricket: cīriḷikā
deer: miga
dodo:
dog: soṇa, kukkuro
dolphin: susu
dove:
dragon: nāga
duck: setahaṁsa
eagle: sakuṇagghi
elephant: hatthin
ewe: urāṇī
fish: maccha
flamingo: rājahaṁsa
fly: makkhikā
fox: jambukā
frog: maṇḍūka
giraffe:
goat: aja
gorilla:
hamster:
hedgehog:
hippopotamus:
honeybee: madhukara
horse: assa
kangaroo:
koala:
leopard: dīpi
lion: sīha
lizard: kakaṇṭaka
llama:
mammoth:
monkey: kapi
mosquito: makasa
mouse: mūsī
octopus:
orangutan:
otter: udda
owl: kosika
ox: camara
panda:
parrot: suka
peacock: mayūra
penguin:
pig: sūkara
poodle:
rabbit: sasa
raccoon:
ram: urabbha, eḷaka
rat: ākhu
rhinoceros: khagga
rooster: kukkuṭa
scorpion: vicchika
seal:
shark: susukā
skunk:
sloth:
snail:
snake: nāga
spider: makkaṭaka
chipmunk: kalandaka
swan: rājahaṁsa
tiger: vyaggha
turkey:
turtle:
unicorn:
whale:
wolf: koka
worm: kimi, gaṇḍuppādā
zebra:
hansa in Sanskrit, I think…
get royal preference because of its superior yo-yo skills 
?
