In this masterwork, Russell H. Tuttle synthesizes a vast research literature in primate evolution and behavior to explain how apes and humans evolved in relation to one another, and why humans became a bipedal, tool-making, culture-inventing species distinct from other hominoids. This encyclopedic volume is both a milestone in primatological research and a critique of what is known and yet to be discovered about human and ape potential.

Table of Contents

• Preface
• 1 Mongrel Models and Seductive Scenarios of Human Evolution
• Part I: Terminology, Morphology, Genes, and Lots of Fossils
• 2 Apes in Space
• 3 Apes in Time
• 4 Taproot and Branches of Our Family Tree
• Part II: Positional and Subsistence Behaviors
• 5 Apes in Motion
• 6 Several Ways to Achieve Erection
• 7 Hungry and Sleepy Apes
• 8 Hunting Apes and Mutualism
• Part III: Hands, Tools, Brains, and Cognition
• 9 Handy Apes
• 10 Mental Apes
• Part IV: Sociality and Communication
• 11 Social, Antisocial, and Sexual Apes
• 12 Communicative Apes
• Part V: What Makes Us Human?
• 13 Language, Culture, Ideology, Spirituality, and Morality
• References
• Illustration Credits