Man and Monkeys 135 
So much for this most modern method of classification, which 
has probably found adherents because it would deliver us from the 
relationship to apes which many people so much dislike. In contrast to 
it we have the second class of special hypotheses of descent, which keeps 
strictly to the nearest structural relationships. This is the only basis 
that justifies the drawing up of a special hypothesis of descent. If 
this fundamental proposition be recognised, it will be admitted that 
the doctrine of special descent upheld by Haeckel, and set forth in 
Darwin’s Descent of Man, is still valid to-day. In the genealogical 
tree, man’s place is quite close to the anthropoid apes; these again 
have as their nearest relatives the lower Old World monkeys, and 
their progenitors must be sought among the less differentiated 
Platyrrhine monkeys, whose most important characters have been 
handed on to the present day New World monkeys. How the 
different genera are to be arranged within the general scheme in- 
dicated depends in the main on the classificatory value attributed 
to individual characters. This is particularly true in regard to 
Pithecanthropus, which I consider as the root of a branch which 
has sprung from the anthropoid ape root and has led up to man; 
the latter I have designated the family of the Hominidae. 
For the rest, there are, as we have said, various possible ways of 
constructing the narrower genealogy within the limits of this branch 
including men and apes, and these methods will probably continue 
to change with the accumulation of new facts. Haeckel himself has 
modified his genealogical tree of the Primates in certain details since 
the publication of his Generelle Morphologie in 1866, but its general 
basis remains the same. All the special genealogical trees drawn 
up on the lines laid down by Haeckel and Darwin—and that of 
Dubois may be specially mentioned—are based, in general, on the 
close relationship of monkeys and men, although they may vary in 
detail. Various hypotheses have been formulated on these lines, 
with special reference to the evolution of man. Pithecanthropus 
is regarded by some authorities as the direct ancestor of man, by 
others as a side-track failure in the attempt at the evolution of man. 
The problem of the monophyletic or polyphyletic origin of the human 
race has also been much discussed. Sergi? inclines towards the 
assumption of a polyphyletic origin of the three main races of man, 
the African primitive form of which has given rise also to the gorilla 
and chimpanzee, the Asiatic to the Orang, the Gibbon, and Pithecan- 
thropus. Kollmann regards existing human races as derived from 
small primitive races (pigmies), and considers that Homo primt- 
genius must have arisen in a secondary and degenerative manner. 
1 Haeckel’s latest genealogical tree is to be found in his most recent work, Unsere 
Ahnenreihe. Jena, 1908. 
2 Sergi, G. Europa, 1908. 
