The name of a baby animal ends with the ending -eau. This is the case, for example, with the baby of the goat (le chevreau), the baby of the shark (le requineau) or the baby of the elephant (l’éléphanteau). It is also common for names to end with the sound “on”, as in the cases of the kitten, the raccoon or the donkey. What about the baby monkey? For a long time, there was no specific term to designate this baby animal. This is all the more logical since there are a multitude of species of monkeys and that when a birth occurs, the baby is systematically called “baby monkey”, regardless of its species. However, there is indeed a word to designate a male baby monkey and a female baby monkey.
While the monkey family includes about 350 different species, the terms used to designate a male, a female and a young are valid for almost all of them. This is particularly true for the chimpanzee, the closest genetic cousin of man. It should be noted that a male chimpanzee is not designated by a particular word, while the female is called a “guenon”. When giving birth, the young may be called a “baby chimpanzee”, but as soon as its sex is known, a specific term can be used to refer to the animal. If it is a small female, the baby chimpanzee is a “guenuche”. On the other hand, if it is a male baby, it may be called a “guenard” or “guenaud”, terms whose origin remains unknown to this day.
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