258 Prof. Nilsson on the extinct and existing 



very large and long, near the roots directed outward and some- 

 what backward, in the middle they are bent forward, and towards 

 the points turned a little upward. 



Synonymy. Urus, Jul. Caesar, Bell. Gall. vi. cap. 28. Plinius Hist. Nat. ii. 



cap. 37. Gesner, Hist. Animal. (Frankfort, 1620) i. p. 145 with fig.; ibid. 



p. 137 (skulls). Cuvier, Ossem. Foss. iv. p. 150. tab. 11. fig. 1-4 ; 12. fig. 



3-8 (skulls). Retz. Vet. Akad. Handl. 1802, p. 282. 

 The Wild Ox, Griffith, Animal Kingdom, iv. p. 111. Bos primigenius, 



Bojanus, Acta Acad. Caesar. Leopold. Carolin. torn. xiii. p. 422. pi. 11. 



N.B. I have not this treatise at hand. 



Description. — This colossal species of Ox, to judge from the 

 skeleton, resembles almost the tame ox in form and the propor- 

 tions of its body, but in its bulk it is far larger. To judge from 

 the magnitude of the horn-cores, it had much larger horns, even 

 larger than the long-horned breed of cattle found in the Cam- 

 pania of Rome. According to all the accounts the colour of this 

 ox was black ; it had white horns with long black points ; the 

 hide was covered with hair like the tame ox, but it was shorter 

 and smooth, with the exception of the forehead, where it was 

 long and curly. 



The only specimens which we now possess of this extinct wild 

 ox, are some skeletons dug up, of which two are at present pre- 

 served here at the Museum of the University, where are also 

 preserved about a dozen skulls of earlier and later specimens. 



The Skeleton. — Skull. — The forehead smooth between the 



manic race seems to have had in common in the earliest times, and signifies 

 forest ox, wild ox (Bos sylvestris) : for Ur, or Or, signifies forest or wood, 

 wilderness, and is still used in many places in Sweden, Norway and Iceland. 

 That the old word Ur or Urd was changed to Or, Ore, Ora, is shown by the 

 word Orrhons, which by the common people in Scania is called Orhons, and 

 in many places in Norway it is called Urhons. The stony and wild tracts 

 which surround the base of the mountains are called in Norway Ore, in 

 Iceland Urd. In Scania there still exist many old forests which bear the 

 name of Ora, and the peasants in some parts of the country say indifferently 

 kora till oran and kora till skogen, which is in both instances " drive to the 

 wood." Also in the older German, Ur signifies wood, forest, but has in 

 compositions of later times been changed into Auer ; ex. gr. Auerochs, Auer- 

 hahn. The Romans, when in Germany, first heard the word Urocs, and 

 as they generally changed all names after the form of their own language, 

 turned it into Urus. The Uroxen which were conveyed to Rome, and highly 

 prized in the bull-fights of the circus, were by the ignorant confounded with 

 the African Antelope Bubalis, wherefote the Urox sometimes by the Latin 

 authors is mentioned under the name of Bubalus, — an error which Pliny 

 notices. 



By our forefathers in Scandinavia as well as in Germany this wild animal 

 is, however, not called Urox, but Ur or Ure, as in the poem of the Nibelunge, 

 v. 3762, thence Urahorn in our old Sagas. In certain provinces an angry 

 mad bull is still called Ure. The Canton of Uri in Switzerland takes its 

 name from this animal, and bears a bull's head in its arms. 



