Not just mother love: Paternity and paternal kinship in wild baboons Susan C. Alberts1,3 and Jeanne Altmann2,3,4 1Department of  Biology, Duke University, 2Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Princeton University, 3Institute for Primate Research, National Museums of Kenya, Kenya, 4Department of Conservation Biology, Chicago Zoological Society Abstract Most cercopithecine primates live in matrilineal societies: females remain in their natal group throughout their lives and associate closely with maternal kin, while males disperse. In addition, many species live in multi-male social groups in which females mate with multiple males, and permanent bonds between males and females do not occur. Male mating success is highly dependent upon male competitive ability; female choice may play a role in male mating success, but males apparently mate with any female that they can gain access to. These features have led to a well-established view of the role that males play in cercopithecine societies: (1) Males, driven by mating competition, mate indiscriminately and do not form permanent bonds with females, and (2) relationships between paternal kin (fathers and offspring and paternal sibs) are quite limited or nonexistent.  Recent advances in studying wild and provisioned cercopithecine populations have revealed that these conclusions are incorrect. Here we discuss results from our study and others, showing that male baboons exhibit mate choice and provide paternal care, and that social bonds between paternal half siblings occur in both baboons and macaques. Consequently, a new view of cercopithecine societies is emerging, in which males carefully allocate their mating and paternal effort, and in which paternal kinship has the potential to structure relationships in the same ways that maternal kinship does.