When viewed within the broader context of our evolutionary history, we are anthropoid primates. That’s the group which contains monkeys and apes (with our species being a specialized variety of ape, and apes being a particular subset of monkeys, and monkeys representing the major group of anthropoids). But how anthropoid primates originated has been a subject of frequent contention.

The current consensus – on the basis of anatomy, genetics, and other lines of evidence – is that anthropoids are most closely related to tarsiers and extinct, tarsier-like primates called omomyiforms. Hence anthropoid primates probably evolved from a tarsier-like ancestor over 40 million years ago. This conclusion replaced the previous leading hypothesis that anthropoids evolved from lemur-like primates called adapiforms. As it