-pithecus

Genera of fossil apes.

Greek pithēkos, ape.

Some examples are Australopithecus (Latin australis, southern), a fossil bipedal primate found in Pliocene and Lower Pleistocene deposits in Africa; Dryopithecus (Greek drus, tree), a fossil anthropoid ape that may be the common ancestor of gorillas, chimpanzees, and humans; Gigantopithecus (Greek gigas, gigant‑, giant), a very large fossil Asian ape of the Upper Miocene to Lower Pleistocene epochs; Ramapithecus (from Rama in the Hindu pantheon), a fossil anthropoid ape of the Miocene epoch, known from remains found in SW Asia and East Africa, and probably ancestral to the orang-utan.