In the Image of Primates

Many satirical interpretations of evolution played with the notion of apes in their newly appointed role as mankind's ancestors. In this alternative to the traditional Christian Nativity scene, a group of learned apes studiesThe Descent of Man and inspects their evolutionary progeny: the first example of Homo sapiens.

A Darwinian Disputation Among the Apes Over the First Human Child by Ernst Moritz Geyger (1892)

Photo: Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Harvey D. Parker Collection