Kite

The kite is named only in the two food-law lists of Leviticus and Deuteronomy, both of which place it among the birds forbidden as food. The two lists overlap but are not identical, and the company the kite keeps shifts slightly between them.

A Forbidden Bird

The Leviticus inventory of unclean birds names the kite alongside the falcon: "and the kite, and the falcon after its kind" (Lev 11:14). The Deuteronomy parallel widens the immediate company by adding the glede and reorders the trio: "and the glede, and the falcon, and the kite after its kind" (Deut 14:13). In both passages the kite is placed in a cluster of birds of prey kept off the table, and "after its kind" generalizes the prohibition to the whole family rather than the single species named.