Penelope Dyan
The Barbary Macaque population in Gibraltar is doing well, but it wasn’t always that way. This is why they are comeback kids! And unlike in North Africa, they are thriving! It is estimated there are three hundred monkeys in five troupes occupying the Upper Rock of Gibraltar. Their occasional trips into town sometimes result in damage to personal property, but they are protected; and no one can do anything about it. Tailless, and known locally as Barbary Apes or Rock Apes, they are really monkeys! (Locals call them monos, which means monkeys). All Gibraltar Barbary Macaques are descended from the North African populations of Barbary Macaques, and DNA evidence has established that the present population of Gibraltar macaques is of relatively recent Algerian and Moroccan origin. The presence of the monkeys is documented as being on the Rock before it was captured by the British in 1704. The original introduction of the macaques was most likely orchestrated by the Moors who occupied southern Iberia, also including Spain and Portugal, between 711 and 1492, and who kept them as pets. The popular belief is that as long as the famed Gibraltar Barbary Macaques exist on Gibraltar, the territory will remain under British rule. In 1942, during World War II, after they dwindled to a mere handful of just seven monkeys, British Prime Minister Sir Winston Churchill ordered their numbers be restored immediately from forests in Morocco and Algeria, because of this belief. It is surmised Gibraltar is linked to Africa by a subterranean passage of 15 miles that begins at Lower St. Michael’s Cave and passes under the great Strait of Gibraltar, and that this is how the Gibraltar Barbary Macaques originally migrated to the rock. After WWII they were protected and cared for by the British Military, and today they are cared for by the Gibraltar Ornithological and Natural History Society. They are now comeback kids!
