Are Doves just a type of Pigeon?
Reverse that. In fact, the fancy name for pigeon is Rock Dove. All the members of Columba are doves, one of them is also known as the pigeon.
Actually there are a number of “pigeons” in the genus Columba - Band-Tailed Pigeons, Red-Billed Pigeon, Plain Pigeon, Scaled Pigeon, etc.
“Pigeon” and “dove” are pretty much synonomous terms - the bigger species are generally called pigeons and the smaller ones doves, but there is no rule or conformity to it. The word pigeon apparently originated as an onomatopoeia ( according to one source, anyway ) - It started as the Latin pipio, from the sounds of baby birds > then French pijon > English pigeon. Webster’s third international seems to think dove was originally from a Germanic root.
- Tamerlane
Another member of the dove/pigeon family was the lovely bird known as the dodo.