Re: A hairy question

Erin Miller (ermiller@tezcat.com)
23 May 1995 15:19:20 -0500

In article <3psmfh$pas@portal.gmu.edu>,
HARRY R. ERWIN <herwin@osf1.gmu.edu> wrote:
>J.F. Brown (jfbrown@touchstone.power.net) wrote:
>: In article <3pi56q$khr@portal.gmu.edu>, herwin@osf1.gmu.edu (HARRY R.
>: ERWIN) wrote:
>
>: > Chimps go bald.
>
>: __________________________________
>
>: Is it chimmp-pattern baldness? :)
>
>: Seriously though, where, anatomically speaking, do chimps go bald? On the
>: head or elsewhere? And is it sex related (as it is in human male-pattern
>: baldness)? A function of ageing? I don't recall ever seeing any elderly
>: chimps with a friar tuck hairdo (except Maurice Evans in the "Planet of
>: the Apes" movies).
>
>It's a pattern baldness, seen in older males. I don't have my references
>at hand.

Allow me:

[talking about bonobos] "Unlike common chimpanzes and some humans, they
appear to escape the distinguishing devastation of alopecia." (Alopecia is
pathologic baldness.).

From: _Apes of the World: Their Social Behavior, Communication, Mentality
and Ecology._ By Russell H. Tuttle, Noyes Publication, Park Ridge NJ.
1986.

And it does seem to happen in males almost exclusively (although some
human females do go bald, too). Whether it is only forehead-origin
balding, or also back-of-the-head origin (the monk look), I do not know.

-erin

--

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  Erin Miller                 http://www.tezcat.com/~ermiller/erin.html

  University of Chicago / Anthropology Department / ermiller@tezcat.com