The scientific idea of evolution predates Darwin - he proposed a plausible mechanism for evolution, rather than the idea itself. Before Darwin, other evolutionists had suggested than apes/monkeys and humans shared common ancestors. Going back much further in time, there were stories that apes/monkeys and humans shared common ancestors, often with apes/monkeys being a degenerate descendant of humans, perhaps cursed by the gods.

For more detail on this, see my answer from a few months ago in https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/l81psm/before_darwins_theory_of_evolution_was_there/