I literally just told you, size. You can go look up the exact ship specifications if you want, the Raptor is a small scout ship, the BoP is a mid-size warship, and the Warbird is a full-sized warship.
Also what are you even talking about, what came into canon first? Of course the Bird of Prey, its from ToS, I do not understand how that is relevant to the discussion.
"Bird of Prey" is a classification of light warship used by both the Romulan and Klingon forces, the smaller version of a "Warbird" class ship.
It is not culturally important to them, anymore than a "Galaxy Class" or "Class III Neutronic Carrier" would be to a human/federation race.
So why don't the translators call them Raptors?
Because "Raptor" is another class of ship, even smaller than a "Bird of Prey", used mainly as a scout ship by the Klingons.
Sorry to ruin your "gotcha" moment.
Uh huh.
Which do you think was introduced to the canon first?
And what is the difference in Klingon between a Raptor and a Bird of Prey? Or do they simply go on context?
I literally just told you, size. You can go look up the exact ship specifications if you want, the Raptor is a small scout ship, the BoP is a mid-size warship, and the Warbird is a full-sized warship.
Also what are you even talking about, what came into canon first? Of course the Bird of Prey, its from ToS, I do not understand how that is relevant to the discussion.