A fictional character, Tarzan (John Clayton II, Viscount Greystoke) is a wild boy reared by the Mangani great apes in the African bush. He eventually encounters civilization but rejects it and returns to the wild as a valiant explorer. Edgar Rice Burroughs created Tarzan, who first appeared in his novel Tarzan of the Apes (published in 1912 as a magazine and in 1914 as a book). Since then, Tarzan has appeared in 23 sequels, numerous books by Burroughs and other authors, and countless additional works in both approved and unofficial media.

Tarzan is the son of a British lord and lady who were marooned on the coast of Africa by mutineers. When Tarzan was an infant, his mother died, and his father was killed by Kerchak, leader of the ape tribe by whom Tarzan was adopted. Soon after his parents’ death, Tarzan became a feral child, and his tribe of apes is known as the Mangani, great apes of a species unknown to science. Kala is his ape mother. Burroughs added stories occurring during Tarzan’s adolescence in his sixth Tarzan book, Jungle Tales of Tarzan.