page_title: Indian spotted eagle
section_title: Systematics, taxonomy and evolution
hierarchical_section_title: Indian spotted eagle / Systematics, taxonomy and evolution
caption_attribution_description: English: Aquila hastata (adult and juvenile) web
context_page_description: The Indian spotted eagle is a large South Asian bird of prey. Like all typical eagles, it belongs to the family Accipitridae. The typical eagles are often united with the buteos, sea eagles and other more heavyset Accipitridae, but more recently it appears as if they are less distinct from the more slender accipitrine hawks.
context_section_description: The Indian spotted eagle was earlier considered as the resident of eastern subspecies of the lesser spotted eagle but has proven quite distinct and readily separable by morphological, behavioral, ecological and DNA sequence data. The Indian lineage seems to have diverged around the middle Pliocene, perhaps some 3.6 million years ago, from the common ancestor of the lesser and greater spotted eagles. The "proto-spotted eagle" probably lived in the general region of Afghanistan, being split into a northern and a southern lineage when both glaciers and deserts advanced in Central Asia as the last ice age began.
  The spotted eagles as a group although quite distinct from the typical members, were formerly included in the genus Aquila, the "true eagles". They are now placed in their separate genus Clanga
caption: Illustration of an adult and a juvenile by Joseph Smit (1875)
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