ABSTRACT
A Swiss zoologist, Emilio Augusto Goeldi, exploring the Brazilian Amazon in 1904, discovered a small, black, shy monkey that had yet to be named scientifically (cited in Heltne, Wojcik, and Pook 1981). The monkeys were given the species name Callimico goeldii, meaning “Goeldi’s beautiful monkeys.” These newly named monkeys were captured and their skins and skeletons were preserved in museums. In subsequent years, other Goeldi’s monkeys, hereafter called callimicos, were captured and shipped to zoological gardens around the world where they were bred successfully, and continue to breed to this day. For nearly 100 years, these museum specimens and zoo animals provided all the information that was known of the species.
