APE-MAN

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does ape-man mean? 

• APE-MAN (noun)
  The noun APE-MAN has 2 senses:

1. hypothetical organism formerly thought to be intermediate between apes and human beings

2. a person assumed to have been raised by apes

  Familiarity information: APE-MAN used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• APE-MAN (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Hypothetical organism formerly thought to be intermediate between apes and human beings

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Synonyms:

ape-man; missing link

Hypernyms ("ape-man" is a kind of...):

primitive; primitive person (a person who belongs to an early stage of civilization)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A person assumed to have been raised by apes

Classified under:

Nouns denoting people

Hypernyms ("ape-man" is a kind of...):

feral man; wild man (a person who is not socialized)

 Context examples 

The ape-man pushed him roughly aside and shook his head.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

In spite of their Unitarian proclivities and their masks of conservative broadmindedness, they were two generations behind interpretative science: their mental processes were mediaeval, while their thinking on the ultimate data of existence and of the universe struck him as the same metaphysical method that was as young as the youngest race, as old as the cave-man, and older—the same that moved the first Pleistocene ape-man to fear the dark; that moved the first hasty Hebrew savage to incarnate Eve from Adam's rib; that moved Descartes to build an idealistic system of the universe out of the projections of his own puny ego; and that moved the famous British ecclesiastic to denounce evolution in satire so scathing as to win immediate applause and leave his name a notorious scrawl on the page of history.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

I was so shocked at the sudden and strange appearance of this ape-man that I hesitated whether I should not climb down again and tell my experience to my companions.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

When the ape-man stood by Challenger and put his paw on his shoulder, the thing was complete.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

But before they discussed the details of my map I had to tell them of my encounter with the ape-man among the branches.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

This old ape-man—he was their chief—was a sort of red Challenger, with every one of our friend's beauty points, only just a trifle more so.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Only above the eyebrows, where the sloping forehead and low, curved skull of the ape-man were in sharp contrast to the broad brow and magnificent cranium of the European, could one see any marked difference.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)