Editing Gorilla (section)

==History and etymology==
{{see also |Hanno the Navigator#Gorillai}}
The word ''gorilla'' comes from the history of [[Hanno the Navigator]] ({{abbr |c. |circa}} 500 BC), a [[Ancient Carthage|Carthaginian]] explorer on an expedition to the west [[Africa]]n coast to the area that later became [[Sierra Leone]].<ref>{{Cite book |author=Müller, C. |title=Geographi graeci minores |year=1855–1861 |pages=1.1–14: text and trans. Ed. J. Blomqvist (1979)}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |first=P. E. H. |last=Hair |title=The ''Periplus of Hanno'' in the history and historiography of Black Africa |journal=[[History in Africa]] |volume=14 |year=1987 |pages=43–66 |doi=10.2307/3171832 |jstor=3171832 |s2cid=162671887}}</ref> Members of the expedition encountered "savage people, the greater part of whom were women, whose bodies were hairy, and whom our interpreters called Gorillae".<ref>{{cite book | chapter=The Voyage of Hanno, commander of the Carthaginians, round the parts of Lilxya beyond the Pillars of Hercules, which he deposited in the temple of Saturn |editor= A.H.L. Heeren| title=Historical researches into the Politics, Intercourse and Trade of the Cathaginians, Ethiopians, and Egyptians| place= Oxford| publisher =D. A. Talboys|date= 1832|pages= 492–501| chapter-url=http://www.shsu.edu/~his_ncp/Hanno.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170314000332/http://www.shsu.edu/~his_ncp/Hanno.html |archive-date=14 March 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |first=M. F. A. |last=Montagu |author-link=Ashley Montagu |title=Knowledge of the Ape in Antiquity |journal=Isis |volume=32 |issue=1 |year=1940 |pages=87–102 |doi=10.1086/347644 |s2cid=143874276}}</ref> It is unknown whether what the explorers encountered were what we now call gorillas, another species of ape or monkeys, or humans.<ref name=Groves2002/> Skins of gorillai women, brought back by Hanno, are reputed to have been kept at Carthage until Rome destroyed the city 350 years later at the end of the [[Punic Wars]], 146 BC.

In 1625 [[Andrew Battel]] mentioned the existence of the animal, under the name Pongo:
{{quote|This Pongo is in all proportion like a man, but... he is more like a Giant in stature, than a man: for he is very tall, [and] hath a man's face, hollow-eyed, with long haire vpon his browes. His face and eares are without haire, and his hands also. His bodie is full of haire, but not very thicke, and it is a dunnish colour. . . Hee goeth alwaies vpon his legs, and carrieth his hands clasped on the nape of his necke, when he goeth upon the ground... They goe many together, and kill many Negroes that trauaile in the Woods . . . Those Pongos are neuer taken aliue, because they are so strong, that ten men cannot hold one of them... |Andrew Battel, 1625<ref name="PBS">{{cite web |title=Fantastic Creatures, part 2 |url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/lochness/creatures2.html | website = NOVA Online | date= November 2000 |publisher=[[Public Broadcasting Service]] |access-date=30 May 2024}}</ref>}}

A century and a half after Battel's story was published, one writer called Radermacher wrote that "the large species, described by [[Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon|Buffon]] and other authors as of the size of a man, is held by many to be a [[Chimera (mythology)|Chimera]]."<ref>{{cite book |last1=Heuvelmans |first1=Bernard |title=On The Track Of Unknown Animals |date=10 July 2014 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-317-84812-7 |page=26 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=u64ABAAAQBAJ&dq=%22the+large+species,+described+by+Buffon+and+other+authors+as+of+the+size+of+a+man,+is+held+by+many+to+be+a+Chimera.%22&pg=PA26 |access-date=2 February 2025 |language=en}}</ref>

The American physician and missionary [[Thomas S. Savage|Thomas Staughton Savage]] and naturalist [[Jeffries Wyman]] first described the [[western gorilla]] in 1847 from specimens obtained in [[Liberia]].<ref name="Conniff">{{Cite journal |doi=10.1002/evan.20203 |title=Discovering gorilla |journal=Evolutionary Anthropology: Issues, News, and Reviews |volume=18 |issue=2 |pages=55–61 |year=2009 |last1=Conniff |first1=R. |s2cid=221732306}}</ref> They called it ''Troglodytes gorilla'', using the then-current name of the chimpanzee genus. The species name was derived {{ety |grc |''Γόριλλαι'' (gorillai) |tribe of hairy women}},<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0057%3Aentry%3D*go%2Frillai |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110606090702/http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0057:entry=*go%2Frillai |archive-date=6 June 2011 |first1=H. G. |last1=Liddell |first2=R. |last2=Scott |work=A Greek-English lexicon |title=Γόριλλαι |publisher=Perseus Digital Library}}</ref> as described by Hanno.