Barbary ape

American  

noun

1. a tailless macaque, Macaca sylvanus, of mountain ranges in northwestern Africa, now greatly reduced in number: a small, managed colony of unknown origin is maintained on the Rock of Gibraltar.

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Barbary ape British  

noun

1. a tailless macaque, Macaca sylvana , that inhabits rocky cliffs and forests in NW Africa and Gibraltar: family Cercopithecidae , order Primates

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Etymology

Origin of Barbary ape

First recorded in 1870–75

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Barbary ape

Was it a bird, a woman, an Afghan hound, a Barbary ape, a cruel hoax, a Communist plot, or Superman?

From Time Magazine Archive

"A Barbary ape could have this position and awe people," he says.

From Time Magazine Archive

From Gibraltar came a Barbary ape, the only native European monkey.

From Time Magazine Archive

An impudent Barbary ape Once tried on a lady's new cape.

From Poems for Pale People A Volume of Verse by Ranck, Edwin Carty

See now, how by diligent shaving, the nether region of your face may preserve its human outline, instead of presenting no distinction from the physiognomy of a bearded owl or a Barbary ape.

From Romola by Eliot, George