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

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

From Time Magazine Archive

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

From Time Magazine Archive

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 monkey with rudimentary tail and red face, allied to the Barbary ape.

From Island Life Or the Phenomena and Causes of Insular Faunas and Floras by Wallace, Alfred Russel

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