Barbary Ape
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macaque
macaque (məkäkˈ), name for Old World monkeys of the genus Macaca, related to mangabeys, mandrills, and baboons. All but one of the 19 species are found in Asia from Afghanistan to Japan, the Philippines, and Borneo. Macaques can be slight, with very long tails, or stocky, with short limbs and a short tail or, in a few species, no tail. They are highly intelligent and display a great variety of calls and facial expressions. A typical macaque is the rhesus monkey (Macaca mulatta) of S Asia. It is yellowish brown with a pale, naked face and a tail about half as long as the body. A large male may reach a body length of 2 ft (60 cm). Rhesus monkeys live in social groups of 25–60 individuals in forests and on rocky hillsides, ranging to high altitudes. Omnivorous feeders, they often raid cultivated fields and gardens. The rhesus monkey has been widely used in medical and other scientific experiments; the Rh blood factor, found in humans as well as monkeys, is named for it. The stump-tailed macaque (M. arctaides) is a nearly tailless, very hairy macaque with a naked pink face, found at high altitudes in SE Asia. One of its close relatives the Japanese macaque (M. fuscata) is the northernmost primate other than man. Its social organization has been extensively studied, and it has been found that there are culturally transmitted behavioral differences among different troops. The single non-Asian macaque is the so-called Barbary ape (M. sylvanus), a large, tailless species of NW Africa, with one colony on the Rock of Gibraltar; it is the only nonhuman primate found in Europe. Macaques are classified in the phylum Chordata, subphylum Vertebrata, class Mammalia, order Primates, family Cercopithecidae.
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The following article is from The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979). It might be outdated or ideologically biased.
Barbary Ape
(Macaca sylvana) or tailless macaque, a monkey of the subfamily Catarrhina. The body is covered with dense reddish yellow fur. The Barbary ape is distributed in northwestern Africa (Morocco, Algeria, and Tunis); it is found in Europe only on the Rock of Gibraltar, where there are ten to 15 monkeys (under state protection). The Barbary ape inhabits mountainous regions, sometimes forming large bands. It readily tolerates cold of — 10°C and lower. It feeds on fruits, edible roots, grains, buds, shoots, coniferous seeds, and insects (locusts, beetles, butterflies). Barbary apes are frequently kept in zoos.
The Great Soviet Encyclopedia, 3rd Edition (1970-1979). © 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. All rights reserved.