 The starling family , Sturnidae , is an entirely Old World group apart from introductions elsewhere , with the greatest numbers of species in Southeast Asia and sub @-@ Saharan Africa . The genus Sturnus is <unk> and relationships between its members are not fully resolved . The closest relation of the common starling is the spotless starling . The non @-@ migratory spotless starling may be descended from a population of ancestral S. vulgaris that survived in an Iberian <unk> during an ice age retreat , and mitochondrial gene studies suggest that it could be considered as a subspecies of the common starling . There is more genetic variation between common starling populations than between nominate common starling and spotless starling . Although common starling remains are known from the Middle Pleistocene , part of the problem in resolving relationships in the Sturnidae is the <unk> of the fossil record for the family as a whole . 
