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It likely resembled modern-day New World monkeys, and was about the same size as a modern howler monkey, which is about 56 to 92 cm (22 to 36 in) long. Aegyptopithecus fossils have been found in the Jebel Qatrani Formation of modern-day Egypt. Aegyptopithecus is believed to be a stem-catarrhine, a crucial link between Eocene and Miocene fossils ...
The Hominidae (/ h ɒ ˈ m ɪ n ɪ d iː /), whose members are known as the great apes [note 1] or hominids (/ ˈ h ɒ m ɪ n ɪ d z /), are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: Pongo (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); Gorilla (the eastern and western gorilla); Pan (the chimpanzee and the bonobo); and Homo, of which only modern humans ...
Human evolution is the evolutionary process that led to the emergence of anatomically modern humans, beginning with the evolutionary history of primates – in particular genus Homo – and leading to the emergence of Homo sapiens as a distinct species of the hominid family, the great apes.
Unlike most monkeys, apes do not possess a tail. Monkeys are more likely to be in trees and use their tails for balance. While the great apes are considerably larger than monkeys, gibbons (lesser apes) are smaller than some monkeys. Apes are considered to be more intelligent than monkeys, which are considered to have more primitive brains. [36]
This grouping comprises the two families: Hylobatidae, the lesser apes or gibbons; and Hominidae, the great apes, including orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, humans, and related extinct genera, such as the prehuman australopithecines and the giant orangutan relative Gigantopithecus.
The Old World species are divided into apes and monkeys depending on the number of cusps on their molars: monkeys have four, apes have five [73] - although humans may have four or five. [79] The main hominid molar cusp evolved in early primate history, while the cusp of the corresponding primitive lower molar (paraconid) was lost. Prosimians ...
The great apes, including hominids, had a more pronounced cerebellum relative to the neocortex than other primates. It has been suggested that because of its function of sensory-motor control and learning complex muscular actions, the cerebellum may have underpinned human technological adaptations, including the preconditions of speech.
Proconsulidae is an early family of primates that lived during the Miocene epoch in Kenya, and was restricted to Africa.Members of the family have a mixture of Old World monkey and ape characteristics, so the placement in the ape superfamily Hominoidea is tentative; some scientists place Proconsulidae outside of Hominoidea in a separately superfamily Proconsuloidea, before the split of the ...