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Systematics, taxonomy, and evolution

The name Corvidae for the family was introduced by the English zoologist William Elford Leach in a guide to the contents of the British Museum published in 1820. Over the years, much disagreement has arisen on the exact evolutionary relationships of the corvid family and their relatives. What eventually seemed clear was that corvids are derived from Australasian ancestors, and spread throughout the world from there. Other lineages derived from these ancestors evolved into ecologically diverse, but often Australasian, groups. In the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, Sibley and Ahlquist united the corvids with other taxa in the Corvida, based on DNA–DNA hybridization. The presumed corvid relatives included: currawongs, birds of paradise, whipbirds, quail-thrushes, whistlers, monarch flycatchers and drongos, shrikes, vireos, and vangas, but current research favors the theory that this grouping is partly artificial. The corvids constitute the core group of the Corvoidea, together with their closest relatives (the birds of paradise, Australian mud-nesters, and shrikes). They are also the core group of the Corvida, which includes the related groups, such as Old World orioles and vireos.

Clarification of the interrelationships of the corvids has been achieved based on cladistic analysis of several DNA sequences. The jays and magpies do not constitute monophyletic lineages, but rather seem to split up into an American and Old World lineage, and an Holarctic and Oriental lineage, respectively. These are not closely related among each other. The position of the azure-winged magpie, which has always been of undistinguished lineage, is less clear than previously thought.

The crested jayshrike (Platylophus galericulatus) is traditionally included in the Corvidae, but is not a true member of this family, being closer to the helmetshrikes (Malaconotidae) or shrikes (Laniidae). Likewise, the Hume's ground "jay" (Pseudopodoces humilis) is, in fact, a member of the tit family, Paridae. The following tree showing the phylogeny of the crow family is based on a molecular study by Jenna Mcullough and collaborators published in 2023.