Editing Spanish sparrow (section)

== Taxonomy and systematics ==
[[File:PasserHispaniolensisGould.jpg|thumb|upright|An illustration by [[John Gould]] of a male Spanish sparrow (above) and an Italian sparrow pair]]
Its taxonomy is greatly complicated by the "biological mix-up" it forms with the house sparrow in the Mediterranean. In most of the Mediterranean, one or both of the two species occurs, with only a limited degree of [[Hybrid (biology)|hybridisation]]. On the [[Italian Peninsula]] and [[Corsica]], the two species are replaced by the [[Italian sparrow]], a puzzling type of sparrow apparently intermediate between the Spanish sparrow and the house sparrow.<ref name=bwp/><ref name="Töpfer"/>

The Italian sparrow has been classified as a hybrid between the Spanish sparrow and the house sparrow, a subspecies of the Spanish sparrow, a subspecies of the house sparrow and/or a separate species. The Spanish sparrow also hybridises freely with the house sparrow in parts of North Africa (northeastern [[Algeria]], [[Tunisia]], and northwestern [[Libya]]), forming highly variable mixed populations with a full range of characters from pure house sparrows to pure Spanish sparrows.<ref name=bwp>{{harvnb|Snow|Perrins|1998|pp=1506–1509}}</ref><ref name="Töpfer">{{cite journal|last=Töpfer|first=Till|year=2006|title=The taxonomic status of the Italian Sparrow – ''Passer italiae'' (Vieillot 1817): Speciation by stabilised hybridisation? A critical analysis|journal=Zootaxa|volume=1325|pages=117–145|doi=10.11646/zootaxa.1325.1.8|issn=1175-5334}}</ref> On the Mediterranean islands of [[Malta]], [[Gozo]], [[Crete]], [[Rhodes]] and [[Karpathos]], there are more apparently intermediate birds of unknown status.<ref>{{harvnb|Summers-Smith|1988|pp=169–170}}</ref>

The Spanish sparrow was first described by the Dutch zoologist [[Coenraad Jacob Temminck]] as ''Fringilla hispaniolensis'', from a specimen collected at [[Algeciras]], in southern Spain. The usual English name refers to the description of the species from Spain. The name ''willow sparrow'', referring to the moist habitat of this bird, is sometimes used, especially when the Italian sparrow is considered the same species.<ref name="Töpfer"/><ref name="Summers162–163">{{harvnb|Summers-Smith|1988|pp= 162–163}}</ref> The genus name ''Passer'' is the [[Latin]] word for sparrow, and ''hispaniolensis'' is  [[Neo-Latin]] for "Spanish".<ref name =job>{{cite book | last= Jobling | first= James A. | year= 2010| title= The Helm Dictionary of Scientific Bird Names | url= https://archive.org/details/Helm_Dictionary_of_Scientific_Bird_Names_by_James_A._Jobling | publisher=Christopher Helm | location = London, United Kingdom | isbn = 978-1-4081-2501-4 | pages =[https://archive.org/details/Helm_Dictionary_of_Scientific_Bird_Names_by_James_A._Jobling/page/n193 193], 294}}</ref>

Two [[subspecies]] of Spanish sparrow are usually recognised, the western [[nominate subspecies]] ''hispaniolensis'', and the eastern ''transcaspicus'', described by Austrian ornithologist [[Viktor von Tschusi zu Schmidhoffen]] in 1902 from [[Ýolöten]], Turkmenistan.<ref name="Summers162–163"/> Birds in [[Anatolia]] and [[Cyprus]] are usually considered to belong to ''P. h. transcaspicus'', but birds as far east as [[Ceylanpınar]] have been noted as intermediates and the difference between the two subspecies may actually be [[Cline (biology)|clinal]].<ref name="SummersTranscaspicus"/>