The Primates: The Primate Order Table

PRIMATE ORDER TAXONOMY
(only major species groups are included in this table) ¹

Suborder	Infraorder	Parvorder	Superfamily	Family	Subfamily	Common Names	Distribution
Strepsirrhini (strepsirrhines: primates with moist noses.) (also known as prosimians)	Lemuriformes (lemurs)			Lemuridae (true lemurs)		ring-tailed, and ruffed lemurs	Madagascar and Comoro Islands (for some species)
				Lepilemuridae		sportive lemurs
				Cheirogaleidae (dwarf lemurs)		dwarf and mouse lemurs
				Indriidae		indris, avahis, and sifakas	Madagascar
				Daubentoniidae		aye-ayes	Madagascar
	Lorisiformes (lorises)			Loridae		lorises, pottos, and angwantibos	lorises--India and Southeast Asia; others--Africa
	Lorisiformes (lorises)			Galagonidae		galagos (or bush babies)	sub-Saharan Africa and Zanzibar
Haplorrhini (haplorrhines: primates with dry noses)	Tarsiiformes ²(tarsiers)			Tarsiidae		tarsiers	Philippines, Borneo, Celebes Islands, and Sumatra
	Simiformes (anthropoids)	Platyrrhini (New World monkeys)		Callitricidae	Calitricinae	marmosets and tamarins	Panama and north and eastern South America
				Cebidae ³	Cebinae	squirrel and capuchin monkeys	forested areas of Central America and/or north and eastern South America
					Aotinae	night and titi monkeys
					Atelinae	howler and spider monkeys
					Pithecinae	uakaris and sakis
		Catarrhini (Old World monkeys, apes and humans)	Cercopithecoidea (Old World monkeys)		Cercopithecinae	guenons, vervets, baboons, macaques, etc.	guenons and baboons--Africa; macaques--northwest Africa, Gibraltar, South and East Asia
			Cercopithecoidea (Old World monkeys)		Colobinae	colobuses, langurs, and proboscis monkeys	colobuses--Central Africa; langurs--India and Southeast Asia; proboscis monkeys-- Borneo
			Hominoidea (apes and humans)	Hylobatidae (lesser apes)		gibbons and siamangs	Southeast Asia
				Hominidae ⁴(hominids--great apes and humans)	Ponginae	orangutans	Sumatra and Borneo
					Gorillinae	gorillas	Central and West Africa
					Homininae	chimpanzees and bonobos	Central and West Africa
					Homininae	humans	originally only tropical tropical and subtropical regions of Africa

1	Some researchers prefer an alternate classification that divides the primates into 2 suborders: Prosimii (lemurs, lorises, and tarsiers) and Anthropoidea (monkeys, apes, and humans). To see what this classification system looks like click here. The taxonomy of the Primate Order is likely to be modified over the next few years as a result of the discovery of new species and the use of DNA sequencing data. At present, there are differences of opinion as to the placement of some species. Several of these differences are referred to in footnotes 2-4 below.
2	Some taxonomists consider tarsiers to be a distinct suborder, the Tarsioidea.
3	Some taxonomists consider the spider and howler monkeys to be in a separate family, the Atelidae.
4	There is an on-going debate as to how close Humans are to the African apes. Some taxonomists consider them to be in a separate family, the Pongidae. This would leave humans in their own family, the Hominidae. In the taxonomic system shown above, humans are combined with the great apes but are separated from them at a lower classification category--the tribe. Humans are assigned to the tribe Hominini while chimpanzees and bonobos are relegated to the tribe Panini. This reflects a growing consensus among primatologists.