Black Bishop - Taxonomy

Taxonomy

The Black Bishop was first described by the German ornithologist Jean Cabanis in 1880 and named after H. Gierow, a Swedish explorer and collector in Angola. It is sometimes placed with E. aureus and E. hordeaceus in a separate genus, Groteiplectes.

A study of the molecular phylogeny of bishops and widowbirds published in 2008 found that it formed part of a clade along with the Fire-fronted Bishop (E. diadematus), Black-winged Red Bishop (E. hordeaceus), Northern Red Bishop (E. franciscanus), Southern Red Bishop (E. orix), Zanzibar Red Bishop (E. nigroventris) and Red-collared Widowbird (E. ardens). An alternate common name is Gierow's Bishop.