On the gestural origins of language: what baboons’ gestures and brain have told us after 15 years of research

Nonhuman primates mostly communicate not only with a rich vocal repertoire but also manual and body gestures. In contrast to great apes, this latter communicative gestural system has been poorly investigated in monkeys. the last 15 years, research we conducted baboons Papio anubis, an Old World monkey species, have shown potential direct evolutionary continuities some key properties of language such as intentionality, referentiality, learning flexibility well its underlying lateralisation hemispheric specialisation brain. According these collective findings, which are congruent ones reported it is thus excluded that features communication shared between humans, apes baboons, may played critical role phylogenetic roots dated back, Hominidae evolution, rather their much older catarrhine common ancestor 25–40 million years ago.