Evidence as to Man's Place in NatureHuxley, Thomas Henry
Science
Evidence as to Man's Place in Nature
Huxley, Thomas Henry
Apes; Evolution; Human beings -- Origin
In 1847, Dr. Savage had the good fortune to make another and most
important addition to our knowledge of the man-like Apes; for, being
unexpectedly detained at the Gaboon river, he saw in the house of the
Rev. Mr. Wilson, a missionary resident there, "a skull represented
by the natives to be a monkey-like animal, remarkable for its
size, ferocity, and habits." From the contour of the skull, and the
information derived from several intelligent natives, "I was induced,"
says Dr. Savage (using the term Orang in its old general sense) "to
believe that it belonged to a new species of Orang. I expressed this
opinion to Mr. Wilson, with a desire for further investigation; and, if
possible, to decide the point by the inspection of a specimen alive or
dead." The result of the combined exertions of Messrs. Savage and Wilson
was not only the obtaining of a very full account of the habits of
this new creature, but a still more important service to science, the
enabling the excellent American anatomist already mentioned, Professor
Wyman, to describe, from ample materials, the distinctive osteological
characters of the new form. This animal was called by the natives of
the Gaboon "Enge-ena," a name obviously identical with the "Ingena"
of Bowdich; and Dr. Savage arrived at the conviction that this last
discovered of all the great Apes was the long-sought "Pongo" of Battell.
The justice of this conclusion, indeed, is beyond doubt--for not only
does the 'Enge-ena' agree with Battell's "greater monster" in its hollow
eyes, its great stature, and its dun or iron-grey colour, but the only
other man-like Ape which inhabits these latitudes--the Chimpanzee--is
at once identified, by its smaller size, as the "lesser monster," and is
excluded from any possibility of being the 'Pongo,' by the fact that
it is black and not dun, to say nothing of the important circumstance
already mentioned that it still retains the name of 'Engeko,' or
"Enche-eko," by which Battell knew it.
In seeking for a specific name for the "Enge-ena," however, Dr. Savage
wisely avoided the much misused 'Pongo'; but finding in the ancient
Periplus of Hanno the word "Gorilla" applied to certain hairy savage
people, discovered by the Carthaginian voyager in an island on the
African coast, he attached the specific name "Gorilla" to his new ape,
whence arises its present well-known appellation. But Dr. Savage, more
cautious than some of his successors, by no means identifies his ape
with Hanno's "wild men." He merely says that the latter were "probably
one of the species of the Orang;" and I quite agree with M. Brulle, that
there is no ground for identifying the modern 'Gorilla' with that of the
Carthaginian admiral.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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