New ape species revealed in all its majesty

In 1842, Queen Victoria visited London Zoo, where Jenny, a female orangutan, made an indelible impression on her, writes Richard Collins.

The creature, Victoria remarked, was “frightful, painfully, disagreeably human”. The animal’s uncanny facial resemblance to a human evoked an intuitive and disturbing sense of kinship between the

monarch and this great ape. Jenny also impressed Charles Darwin. She was equally fascinated by him and the images of herself in the mirror he had brought along.