Barbary macaques were once widely distributed in Europe, as far north as England, from the Early Pliocene (Zanclean) to the Late Pleistocene, as recently as 85-40,000 years ago.

[9] The Barbary macaque was included in the grouping Simia by Conrad Gessner in his 1551 work Historia Animalium,[9] a name which he claimed was already in use by the Greeks.

[7] Polymerase chain reaction studies have found Alu element insertions, small pieces of genetic code in genomes, can infer primate phylogenetic relationships.

Remains from Norfolk, England, dating to the Middle Pleistocene, at 53 degrees latitude, are amongst the northernmost records of non-human primates.

[16] Fossils of Macaca sylvanus are known from the Plio-Pleistocene Guefaït-4.2 site in Morocco, where paired δ13C and δ18O measurements indicate that the macaque consumed primarily the fresh fruits and leaves of C3 plants.

[17] The Barbary macaque has a dark pink face with a pale buff to golden brown to grey pelage and a lighter underside.

[7] The Barbary macaque also occurs in the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar at the southern tip of Europe's Iberian Peninsula.

Gibraltar historian Alonso Hernández del Portillo noted in the early 17th century that the macaques had been present "from time immemorial".

[25] During World War II, Winston Churchill ordered for more Barbary macaques to be introduced to Gibraltar to reverse population declines.

[2] It can live in a variety of habitats, such as cedar, fir, and oak forests, grasslands, thermophilous scrub, and rocky ridges full of vegetation in Mediterranean climate with seasonal extremes of temperature.

[7] In Algeria, the Barbary macaque inhabits mainly Grande and Petite Kabylia, ranges that form part of the Tell Atlas mountain chain, but there is also an isolated population in Chréa National Park.

[26] Fossil evidence indicates that the Barbary macaque occurred in southern Europe during the Pleistocene and during interglacial periods also in England.

[36] These multiple matings by females decrease the certainty of paternity of male Barbary macaques and may lead them to care for all infants within the group.

Almost every part of the plant is eaten, including flowers, fruits, seeds, seedlings, leaves, buds, bark, gum, stems, roots, bulbs, and corms.

Common prey caught and consumed by Barbary macaques are snails, earthworms, scorpions, spiders, centipedes, millipedes, grasshoppers, termites, water striders, scale insects, beetles, butterflies, moths, ants, and even tadpoles.

[7] Barbary macaques can cause major damage to the trees in their prime habitat, the Atlas cedar forests in Morocco.

Since deforestation in Morocco has become a major environmental problem in recent years, research has been conducted to determine the cause of the bark stripping behaviour demonstrated by these macaques.

[7] Wild populations of Barbary macaques have suffered a major decline in recent years to the point of being declared an endangered species on the IUCN Red List since 2008.

The Barbary macaque is threatened by fragmentation and degradation of forest habitat, and poaching for the illegal pet trade; it is also killed in retaliation for raiding crops.

An unknown number of individuals are living in zoological collections, at other institutions, in private hands, in quarantine, or waiting to be relocated to appropriate destinations.

Once common throughout northern Africa and southern Mediterranean Europe, only an estimated 12,000 to 21,000 Barbary macaques are left in Morocco and Algeria.

By the Pleistocene, it inhabited the warmer Mediterranean regions of Europe, from the Balearic Islands and mainland Iberia and France in the west, east to Italy, Sicily, Malta, and as far north as Germany and Norfolk in the British Isles.

[41] The species decreased with the arrival of the last Last Glacial Period, going functionally extinct on the Iberian Peninsula except for Gibraltar around 30,000 years ago.

Information collected in the interviews with inhabitants in the High Atlas of Morocco indicated that the capture of macaques occurs in these regions.

In the High Atlas of Morocco, macaques attract a large number of tourists every year, and they are favoured for their potential benefits to tourism.

[43][44][45][46][47][48] In the Central High Atlas, the Barbary macaque occurs in relatively small and fragmented areas restricted to the main valleys at elevations of 700–2,400 m (2,300–7,900 ft).

In a 2013 study, researchers reported that they found Barbary macaques in relatively small and fragmented habitats in 10 sites, and that the species no longer occurred in four localities.

[43] Many of the mistaken ideas about human anatomy contained in the writings of Galen are apparently due to his use of the Barbary macaque, the only anthropoid available to him, in dissections.

Although tourism has the potential to bring in money towards conservation goals and provides an incentive for the protection of natural habitats, close proximity and interactions with tourists can also have significant psychological impacts on the Barbary macaques.

Fecal samples and stress-indicating behaviours, such as belly scratching, indicate that the presence of tourists has a negative impact on the macaques.