The genus Formicarius was introduced by the Dutch naturalist Pieter Boddaert in 1783 in his catalogue of the ten volumes of hand-coloured plates that had been engraved by François-Nicolas Martinet.
The plates were produced to accompany Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon's Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux.
The type species was subsequently designated as the rufous-capped antthrush (Formicarius colma) by the English zoologist George Robert Gray in 1840.
The generic name Formicarius is Latin for "of the ant".

The genus contains six species:
The genus Formicarius was introduced by the Dutch naturalist Pieter Boddaert in 1783 in his catalogue of the ten volumes of hand-coloured plates that had been engraved by François-Nicolas Martinet. The plates were produced to accompany Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon's Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux. The type species was subsequently designated as the rufous-capped antthrush (Formicarius colma) by the English zoologist George Robert Gray in 1840. The generic name Formicarius is Latin for "of the ant".
The genus contains six species:
Formicarius (bird)