h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I've never met an actual gorilla, though I have met a bonobo, introduced to me back in the eatly 60s (I was 10 years of age at the time) as a chimpanzee, back in age before chimps and bonobos were officially differentiated.

His keeper put me face to face with the bonobo, betting me that the ape would be able to work some wire puzzles he showed me, made of hardened bent finishing nails, with which the task was to unlock them and interlock them, more quickly than I would.

I'd never seen puzzles of the type before and figured that since the ape had considerable experience with those wire puzzles, he would probably win the contest.

I accepted the challenge anyway.

The bonobo won.

Another point that strongly impressed me at the time was the bonobo's upright stance and bipedal gait, very human-like.

The bonobo's diet in captivity was very similar to that of a human being, running a little more strongly to greens, fruits and vegetables and he preferred his eggs raw.

There being no official standard on the point, his keeper was indulgent with respect to allowing him his tastes.

Distinguishing between chimps and bonobos, the single point on which they differ most strongly is the articulation of their feet, the organization of the feet of the bonobo being plantigrade, though not in the same way that the feet of human beings and drills are plantigrade, with the toes all grouped together at the front of the foot, the great toe of the bonobo coming off the side of the foot about half way between the other toes and the heel.

There's a famous scene in the second Johnny Weismuller Tarzan movie in which Cheetah, an unequivocal chimpanzee 'gives us five', splaying the fingers and toes of hind foot, revealing a hand every bit as well articulated as the human hand.

The pelvis of the bonobo is also articulated differently from that of the chimpanzee to support upright stance and bipedal locomotion and there are also some more subtle differences of their heads and facial features.

Returning to gorillas, the ferocious reputation they've had historîcally probably originated with threat displays of the male lowland gorilla of the Congo, early observors, threatened by an animal as large as that having little sense that there is more bluff and bluster to the display than serious hostile intent.

An important, unfortunately long extinct gorilloid, with a distribution over the Indian subcontinent, is ramapithecus, a gorilloid with an even more prominent sagital crest than the modern gorilla, which had apparently advanced to a level of making primitive stone tools and fires before they went extinct as a consequence of the Lake Toba disaster, which almost wiped out humanity in the bargain.

Humanity had a greater geographical distribution extending into regions less severely impacted by the Lake Toba disaster.

Other apes, I frequently, during my late pre-teens, got out to Prentice Park Zoo, Santa Ana, California, where they had a highly successful breeding colony of gibbons,

Hello ITIWBS! Thanks very much for your comment about bonobo encounters! Over here, I've only seen regular chimps so far. I certainly intend to feature them here soon, and also regular chimps and eastern gorillas.

I was thinking also on your comments on largest humans.

The largest I've ever met were a group on Mandan native Americans, all males, varying from a 6' 6" teenager who weighed somewhat more than 200 pounds, to an adult somewhat over 7' who weighed about 300 pounds, in all four cases, all bone and muscle with very little fat, if any.

I've also met a group of semi-pro football players who were a bit leaner than the Mandan group, all adults, with heights varying between 6' 6" and 7".

Charles Darwin, in his account of the voyage of the Beagle, mentions a seven foot female native to Patagonia who was being returned there by Frazer after attending a missionary school in England.

Boys, by the way, usually grow up taller than their mothers, irrespective of the size of their fathers.

The tallest, and most massive, human population on Earth, these days, is probably the people of Tonga.

One of their past Kings stood 10' in height.