__NOTOC__ Malaconotoidea is a

superfamily SUPERFAMILY is a database and search platform of structural and functional annotation for all proteins and genomes. It classifies amino acid sequences into known structural domains, especially into SCOP superfamilies. Domains are functional, str ...

passerine A passerine () is any bird of the order Passeriformes (; from Latin 'sparrow' and '-shaped'), which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds, passerines are distinguished from other orders of birds by t ...

birds. They contain a vast diversity of omnivorous and carnivorous

songbird A songbird is a bird belonging to the suborder Passeri of the perching birds (Passeriformes). Another name that is sometimes seen as the scientific or vernacular name is Oscines, from Latin ''oscen'', "songbird". The Passeriformes contains 500 ...

s widespread in Africa and Australia, many of which superficially resemble

shrike Shrikes () are passerine birds of the family Laniidae. The family is composed of 34 species in four genera. The family name, and that of the largest genus, ''Lanius'', is derived from the Latin word for "butcher", and some shrikes are also know ...

s. It was defined and named by Cacraft and colleagues in 2004 and contains the

bushshrike The bushshrikes are smallish passerine birds. They were formerly classed with the true shrikes in the family Laniidae, but are now considered sufficiently distinctive to be separated from that group as the family Malaconotidae, a name that allud ...

s (Malaconotidae),

helmetshrike Helmetshrikes are a family uniting some smallish to mid-sized songbird species. They were included with the true shrikes in the family Laniidae, later on split between several presumably closely related groups such as bushshrikes ( Malaconotidae ...

s (Prionopidae),

iora : ''For the international organization, see Indian Ocean Rim Association'' : ''For the Australian Aboriginal people of the Sydney region, see Eora'' The ioras are a small family, Aegithinidae, of four passerine bird species found in south and sou ...

s (Aegithinidae),

vanga The family Vangidae (from ''vanga'', Malagasy for the hook-billed vanga, ''Vanga curvirostris'') comprises a group of often shrike-like medium-sized birds distributed from Asia to Africa, including the vangas of Madagascar to which the family o ...

s (Vangidae) and the Australian butcherbirds, magpies, currawongs and woodswallows (

Artamidae Artamidae is a family of passerine birds found in Australia, the Indo-Pacific region, and Southern Asia. It includes 24 extant species in six genera and three subfamilies: Peltopsinae (with one genus, ''Peltops''), Artaminae (with one genus conta ...

). Molecular analysis in 2006 added the

Bornean bristlehead The Bornean bristlehead (''Pityriasis gymnocephala''), also variously known as the bristled shrike, bald-headed crow or the bald-headed wood-shrike, is the only member of the passerine family (biology), family Pityriasidae and genus ''Pityriasi ...

to the group, though its position in the Malconotoidea is unclear. It was initially thought related to the butcherbirds and woodswallows but now is thought to be an early offshoot. In 2012, Jerome Fuchs and colleagues extensively analysed the Malaconotoidea (called by them Malaconotidea), using both mitochondrial and nuclear DNA. The resulting tree suggested that the group originated in Australasia and prolifically diversified in Africa after an ancestor crossed to Africa between 45 and 33.7 million years ago during the late

Eocene The Eocene ( ) Epoch is a geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (mya). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period (geology), Period in the modern Cenozoic Era (geology), Era. The name ''Eocene' ...

. This is based on the basal position of group comprising the woodswallows and butcherbirds and allies and (most likely) the boatbills. Complicating the picture is that some Malaysian species such as the Bornean bristlehead, flycatcher-shrikes, the ''Philentoma''s, and woodshrikes appear to be more closely related to African species. A cladistic study of the bony characteristics of the skulls of various Malaconotoidea and relatives, and focussing on vangas, published in 2008, found broad agreement in the inclusion of woodswallows, butcherbirds and vangas in Malaconotoidea, but also yielded some results at odds with other studies—the red-backed shrike,

crested drongo The crested drongo (''Dicrurus forficatus'') is a passerine bird in the family Dicruridae. It is black with a bluish-green sheen, a distinctive crest on the forehead and a forked tail. There are two subspecies; ''D. f. forficatus'' is endemic t ...

and

magpie-lark The magpie-lark (''Grallina cyanoleuca''), also known as wee magpie, peewee, peewit or mudlark, is a passerine bird native to Australia, Timor and southern New Guinea. The male and female both have black and white plumage, though with different ...

were nested within the group. The authors conceded that there were not enough data to conclude these species should be placed here. The superfamily contains eight families: *

Machaerirhynchidae ''Machaerirhynchus'' is a genus of passerine birds with affinities to woodswallows and butcherbirds. The two species are known as boatbills. The genus is distributed across New Guinea and northern Queensland. The species are: * Black-breasted ...

– boatbills *

– woodswallows, butcherbirds, currawongs, and Australian magpie * Rhagologidae – mottled berryhunter * Malaconotidae – puffback shrikes, bush shrikes, tchagras, and boubous *

Pityriaseidae The Bornean bristlehead (''Pityriasis gymnocephala''), also variously known as the bristled shrike, bald-headed crow or the bald-headed wood-shrike, is the only member of the passerine family (biology), family Pityriasidae and genus ''Pityriasi ...

– bristlehead * Aegithinidae – ioras *

Platysteiridae Platysteiridae is a family of small, stout passerine birds of the African tropics. The family contains the wattle-eyes, batises and shrike-flycatchers. They were previously classed as a subfamily of the Old World flycatchers, Muscicapidae. These ...

– wattle-eyes and batises * Vangidae – vangas

References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q16985089 Bird superfamilies Passeri