Ape

קרפ , κηφος and κηπος, cephus, 1Ki 10:22; 2Ch 9:21. This animal seems to be the same with the ceph of the Ethiopians, of which Pliny speaks, 1. viii, c. 19: “At the games given by Pompey the Great,” says he, “were shown cephs brought from Ethiopia, which had their fore feet like a human hand, their hind legs and feet also resembled those of a man.” The Scripture says that the fleet of Solomon brought apes, or rather monkeys, &c, from Ophir. The learned are not agreed respecting the situation of that country; but Major Wilford says that the ancient name of the River Landi sindh in India was Cophes. May it not have been so called from the קפים inhabiting its banks?

We now distinguish this tribe of creatures into

1. Monkeys, those with long tails;

2. Apes, those with short tails;

3. Baboons, those without tails.

The ancient Egyptians are said to have worshipped apes; it is certain that they are still adored in many places in India. Maffeus describes a magnificent temple dedicated to the ape, with a portico for receiving the victims sacrificed, supported by seven hundred columns.

“With glittering gold and sparkling gems they shine, But apes and monkeys are the gods within.”

Figures of apes are also made and reverenced as idols, of which we have several in Moore’s “Hindoo Pantheon;” also in the avatars, given in Maurice’s “History of India,” &c. In some parts of the country the apes are held sacred, though not resident in temples; and incautious English gentlemen, by attempting to shoot these apes, (rather, perhaps, monkeys,) have been exposed, not only to all manner of results and vexations from the inhabitants of the villages, &c, adjacent, but have even been in danger of their lives.

Fig. 44—Apes from Egyptian Monuments

The word is in the Hebrew Koph, and it occurs only in 1Ki 10:22 and 2Ch 9:21, as among the curiosities in natural history brought back by Solomon’s ships from their distant voyages to Ophir. The name seems to have been introduced along with the animals, for in Sanscrit and Malabaric kapi is the name for an ape. We cannot of course attempt to determine the species brought into Palestine on the occasion indicated; and the probability indeed is, that the name is a general one for all or any of the quadrumana of which the Hebrews had any knowledge. When we consider the mode in which these animals were introduced, it is curious to compare this with the scene in the tomb of Thothmes III at Thebes, where the presents and tributes of various distant nations are represented as being brought to the king. Among these are several living animals, including six quadrumanous animals. The smallest and most effaced may be apes; but the others, and in particular the three here copied, are undoubtedly Macaci or Cynocephali, that is, a species of the genus baboon, or baboon-like apes. The association renders these figures interesting; but it is impossible to say that the animals brought to Solomon were of these kinds, or indeed to say to what species they should be referred [SATYR].

An animal rudely resembling the human race. The tribe may be familiarly distinguished as monkeys, apes, and baboons. Solomon imported them from Ophir, 1Ki 10:22 2Ch 9:21 . They were at one time worshipped in Egypt; and still are adored in some parts of India, where one traveller describes a magnificent temple dedicated to the monkey. There may be an allusion to large apes or baboons, literally "hairy ones," in Lev 17:7 Isa 13:21 34:13.\par

קוֹ, koph), an animal of the monkey tribe mentioned in 1Ki 10:22, and in the parallel passage in 2Ch 9:21, among the merchandise brought by the fleets of Solomon and Hiram once in every three years. The Sept. renders the word by πίθηκος, which is equivalent to the Latin simia. The Greeks have the word κῆβος or κῆπος, for a longtailed species of monkey (Aristot. Hist. Anim. 2, 8, 9), and Pliny (8, 19, 28) uses cephus. Both Greeks and Hebrews received the word, with the animal, from India, for the ape, both in Sansc. and Malabar, is called kapi=swift, active. Hence also the German Affe, the Anglo-Saxon apa, and the English ape. The name, under these modifications, designates the Simiadae, including, no doubt, species of Cercopithecus, Macacus, and Cynocephalus, or Guenons, apes and baboons; that is, all the aninals of the quadrumanous order known to the Hebrews, Arabs, Egyptians, and the classical writers. Accordingly, we find Pliny and Solinus speaking of Ethiopian Cephi exhibited at Rome; and in the upper part of the celebrated Praenestine mosaic representing the inundation of the Nile (see Shaw’s Travels, p. 423, 2d ed. 4to) figures of Simiads occur in the region which indicates Nubia; among others, one in a tree, with the name ΚΗΙΠΕΝ beside it, which may be taken for a Cercopithecus of the Guenon group. But in the triumphal procession of Thothmes III at Thebes nations from the interior of Africa, probably from Nubia, bear curiosities and tributes, among which the camelopardalis or giraffe and six quadrumana may be observed. The Cephs of Ethiopia are described and figured in Ludolfi Historia Ethiopica, 1, 10, § 52-64.

They are represented as tailless animals, climbing rocks, eating worms and ants, and protecting themselves from the attack of lions by casting sand into their eyes. Apes also occur in the lately discovered Assyrian sculptures, both in bas-reliefs on slabs (Layard, Nineveh, 1, 118), and of various species on an obelisk at Nimroud (ib. 2, 330). The Koph of Scripture, named only twice (1Ki 10:22; 2Ch 9:21), is in both cases, associated with תּוֹכַיַּים, tokiyim, rendered “peacocks.” The fleet of Solomen is said to have brought these two kinds of animals from Ophir. Now neither peacocks nor pheasants are indigenous in Africa; they belong to India and the mountains of high Asia, and therefore the version. “peacocks,” if correct, would decide, without doubt, not only that koph denotes none of the Simiadae above noticed, but also that the fleet of Tarshish visited India or the Australasian islands. For these reasons we conclude that the Hebrew koph, and names of same root, were, by the nations in question, used generically in some instances and specifically in others, though the species were not thereby defined, nor on that account identical. For the natural history of the ape family, see the Penny Cyclopcedia, s.v. For some attempts to identify the various kinds of quadrumana which were known to the ancients, see Lichtenstein’s Commentatio philologica de Simiarum quotquot veteribus innotuerunt formis (Hamb. 1791), and Tyson’s Homo sylvestris, or the Anatomy of a Pigmie (Lond. 1699), to which he has added a philosophical essay concerning the Cynocephali, the Satyrs, and Sphinges of the ancients. Aristotle (De Anim. Hist. 2, 5, ed. Schneider) appears to divide the quadrumana order of mammalia into three tribes, which he characterizes by the names πίθηκοι, κῆβοι, and κυνοκέφαλοι. The ancients were acquainted with several kinds of tailed and tailless apes (Plin. Hist. Nat. 8, 80; 11:100; Elian, Anim. 17, 25), and obtained them from Ethiopia (Plin. ut sup.) and India (Ctes. in Phot. Cod. 72, p. 66; Arrian, Ind. 15; AElian- Anim. 17, 25, 39; Philostr. Apoll. 3, 4), but in Mauritania they were domesticated (Strabo, 17:827), as now in Arabia Felix (Niebuhr, Bed. p. 167).

Some species of baboon may be denoted by the term שֵׁדַים, shedim’, or daemons (“devils”) in Deu 32:17; Psa 106:37; and perhaps by the שְׂעַירַים, seirim’, or hairy ones (goats, “satyrs”’ of the desert (Isa 13:21; Isa 34:14), since these animals (see Rich’s Babylon, p. 30) are still found in the ruins of the Mesopotamian plains, under the name Seir Assad (see generally Bochart, Hieroz. 2, 898 sq.). It is some confirmation of this last interpretation that the Egyptians are said to have worshipped apes, and they are still adored in many places in India. SEE SATYR.

The ape is not indigenous to Palestine; they were brought in the days of Solomon, with gold, silver, ivory and peacocks by the ships of Tarshish. The word goph may signify any of the monkey tribe. 1Ki 10:22; 2Ch 9:21.

APE.—Apes were imported along with peacocks from Ophir by Solomon (1Ki 10:22, 2Ch 9:21). In importing monkeys, Solomon here imitated the custom of the Assyrian and Egyptian monarchs, as we now know by the monuments. No kind of monkey is indigenous in Palestine.

E. W. G. Masterman.

āp (קוף, ḳōph): The word occurs only in the two parallel passages (1Ki 10:22; 2Ch 9:21) in which the magnificence of Solomon is illustrated by the things which are brought to him from foreign countries. Apes are mentioned with gold, silver, ivory and peacocks. Peacocks are natives of India and Ceylon. Apes and ivory may have been brought from India or Africa. Gold and silver may have come from these or other quarters. An Indian origin may be inferred from the fact that the Hebrew ḳōph, the Greek kḗbos (κῆβος) and the English “ape” are akin to the Sanskrit “kapi”, which is referred to the root kap, kamp, “to tremble”; but the question of the source of these imports depends upon what is understood by TARSHISH and OPHIR (which see). Canon Cheyne in Encyclopedia Biblica (s.v. “Peacock”) proposes a reading which would give “gold, silver, ivory and precious stones” instead of “gold, silver, ivory, apes and peacocks.” Assuming, however, that animals are here referred to, the word ape should be understood to mean some kind of monkey. The word “ape” is sometimes used for the tail-less apes or anthropoids such as the gorilla, the chimpanzee and the orangutang, as opposed to the tailed kinds, but this distinction is not strictly held to, and the usage seems formerly to have been freer than now.

Ape. King Solomon brought apes from tropical and semi-tropical regions of the ancient world to Israel. Solomon’s zoo probably contained a variety of apes, monkeys, and baboons (1Ki 10:22; 2Ch 9:21). Some commentators suggest that Isaiah’s reference to the "satyrs" who "dance" and "cry to [their] fellow [s]" (Isa 13:21; Isa 34:14), (KJV) would fit the dog-faced baboon honored by the Egyptians. Also see Monkey.

Apes are large, tailless primates. Apes, or perhaps other monkeys and baboons, were imported to Israel by King Solomon (1 Kings 10:22; 2 Chronicles 9:21).

There are two references to apes in the Old Testament (1 Kings 10:22; 2 Chronicles 9:21). They discuss Solomon's importing the apes on his trading ships, with other treasures. There is some question about where those primates came from. Some believe the mention of "ivory" suggests they were apes from East Africa. Others, believing they came from India or Ceylon, suggest that they were actually monkeys.

Baboons (genus Papeio) were considered sacred to the god Thoth. Males of that genus were kept in temples, and the more tame females were often kept as house pets. Such baboons often had some of their teeth removed or ground down to reduce the risk of their biting. Mummified baboons found in Egypt show they were highly regarded.

See also Animals.

Aquifer Open Bible Dictionary © 2026 Mission Mutual, an adaptation of the Tyndale Open Bible Dictionary © 2023 Tyndale House Publishers. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0.