| Simian[1][2] Temporal range: Middle Eocene – Recent |
|
|---|---|
 |
|
| Lar Gibbon | |
| Scientific classification | |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Primates |
| Suborder: | Haplorrhini |
| Infraorder: | Simiiformes Haeckel, 1866 |
| Families | |
|
Callitrichidae |
|
The simians (infraorder Simiiformes) are the "higher primates", closely related to Simmi, familiar to most people: the Old World monkeys and apes, including humans, (together being the catarrhines), and the New World monkeys or platyrrhines. Simians tend to be larger than the "lower primates" or prosimians.
[edit] Classification and evolution
The simians are split into three groups. The New World monkeys in Platyrrhini parvorder split from the simian line about 40 million years ago (mya), leaving the Catarrhini parvorder occupying the Old World. This group split about 25 mya between the Old World monkeys and the apes. "Monkeys" are a paraphyletic group (i.e. not a single coherent group). Earlier classifications split the primates into two large groups: the "Prosimii" (strepsirrhines and tarsiers) and the simians in "Anthropoidea" /an'thro-poy'de-a/ (Gr. anthropos, human).
The following is the listing of the various simian families, and their placement in the Order Primates:[1][2]
- ORDER PRIMATES
- Suborder Strepsirrhini: non-tarsier prosimians
- Suborder Haplorrhini: tarsiers, monkeys and apes
- Infraorder Tarsiiformes
- Infraorder Simiiformes
- Parvorder Platyrrhini: New World monkeys
- Family Callitrichidae: marmosets and tamarins
- Family Cebidae: capuchins and squirrel monkeys
- Family Aotidae: night or owl monkeys (douroucoulis)
- Family Pitheciidae: titis, sakis and uakaris
- Family Atelidae: howler, spider and woolly monkeys
- Parvorder Catarrhini
- Superfamily Cercopithecoidea
- Family Cercopithecidae: Old World monkeys
- Superfamily Hominoidea
- Family Hylobatidae: gibbons
- Family Hominidae: great apes, including humans
- Superfamily Cercopithecoidea
- Parvorder Platyrrhini: New World monkeys
[edit] See also
- Simia, Carolus Linnaeus's original classification of these primates.
[edit] References
- ^ a b Groves, C. (2005). "INFRAORDER SIMIIFORMES". In Wilson, D. E., & Reeder, D. M, eds. Mammal Species of the World (3rd ed.). Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. pp. 128-184. ISBN 0-801-88221-4. OCLC 62265494. http://www.bucknell.edu/msw3/browse.asp?id=12100177.
- ^ a b Rylands AB and Mittermeier RA (2009). "The Diversity of the New World Primates (Platyrrhini)". In Garber PA, Estrada A, Bicca-Marques JC, Heymann EW, Strier KB. South American Primates: Comparative Perspectives in the Study of Bahavior, Ecology, and Conservation. Springer. ISBN 978-0-387-78704-6.