Gibraltar Barbary macaques

Originally from the Atlas Mountains and the Rif Mountains of Morocco, the Barbary macaque population in Gibraltar is the only wild monkey population on the European continent. Although most Barbary monkey populations in Africa are experiencing decline due to hunting and deforestation, the Gibraltar population is increasing. , some 300 animals in five troops occupy the Upper Rock area of the Gibraltar Nature Reserve, though they make occasional forays into the town. As they are a tailless species, they are also known locally as Barbary apes or rock apes, despite being classified as monkeys (''Macaca sylvanus''). Spanish speakers simply refer to them as ''monos'' () when conversing in Spanish, although English is the native language as the area is a British overseas territory.

Origin

The name Barbary refers to the Berber People of North Africa who, since the beginning of history, had ties with the animals surrounding their region, as the Barbary macaques. The macaque population had also been present on the Rock of Gibraltar long before Gibraltar was captured by the British in 1704 and according to records, since prior to reconquest of Gibraltar from the Muslims. It was during the Islamic period where a purported introduction may have taken place. In his work ''Historia de la Muy Noble y Más Leal Ciudad de Gibraltar'' (''History of the Very Noble and Most Loyal City of Gibraltar''), written between 1605 and 1610, Alonso Hernández del Portillo, the first chronicler of Gibraltar, wrote:

In his ''History of Gibraltar'' (1782), Ignacio López de Ayala, a Spanish historian like Portillo, wrote of the monkeys:

Repeated introduction of animals and the lack of reliable data concerning founders of the Gibraltar macaque population has obscured their origin. The fact that all extant Gibraltarian mtDNA haplotypes were also found in North Africa, combined with the lack of fossil evidence of ''M. sylvanus'' in Gibraltar at the end of the last glaciation, greatly diminishes the possibility that the Gibraltar macaques represent or include any remnant of the original European population, a possibility which can nevertheless not be excluded.Phylogeography of Barbary macaques (''Macaca sylvanus'') and the origin of the Gibraltar colony
Clear distinction between Algerian and Moroccan haplotypes permits attribution of the Gibraltar colony to founders from both regions. Indeed, it had been earlier suggested that the original Gibraltar macaques were a remnant of populations that had spread throughout Southern Europe during the Pliocene

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