CHAPTER X 



ELEPHANTS, EVOLUTION OF; ALSO 

 MASTODON, MAMMOTH, ETC. 



The first step in the evolution of the elephant is recorded 

 in the fossil remains of the Moeritherium, which have been 

 found in the Eocene and early Oligocene beds of the Fayum, 

 Egypt, and have quite recently been reported from the 

 Oligocene of India.* The remains of this tapir-like animal 

 clearly show an early stage of the development of the trunk, 

 in the unmistakable indication of a prehensile upper lip, 

 and also the beginnings of the tusks denoted by the sharply 

 projecting incisors of the upper jaw. The Moeritherium 

 was only about three and a half feet high, and the original 

 type is still found in the Lower Oligocene, along with the 

 Palseomastodons, representing the gradual evolution of 

 certain Mceritheria into a type more closely resembling the 

 elephant. The Oligocene strata have not as yet offered any 

 remains illustrating the further development of the ele- 

 phant, except in India, where fragmentary remains of a 

 more advanced stage, Hemimastodon, have lately been 

 found. t Its earliest migration into Europe must have 

 been in the early Miocene age, and in the Middle Miocene 

 the elephant had already penetrated into North America. 



*Dr. W. D. Matthew, Curator of the American Museum of Natural History, New York 

 City, kindly offered many suggestions and added materially to this chapter. 



fGuy E. Pilgrim, 1912, "The Vertebrate Fauna of the Gaj Series in the Bugti Hills and 

 the Punjab, " Palseontologia Indica, New Series, Vol. IV, Memoir No 2, pp. 1-83, plates 

 i-xxx. 



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