APE, the English name, until the 16th century, for animals of the monkey tribe, and now applied specifically to the tailless rep resentatives of the group. These comprise the great or anthropoid apes of the family Simiidae, which include the orang-utan, of Borneo and Sumatra, and the chimpanzee and gorilla, of central Africa, and also the much smaller gibbons (family Hylobatidae), of which about 12 species, all tree-dwellers, are found in south eastern Asia and the larger East India islands. See PRIMATES : Anthropoid Apes; CHIMPANZEE; GIBBON ; GORILLA ; ORANG-UTAN.