8 



NAME. 



"When the bones of the Mastodon were first discovered in quantity, 

 they were supposed to belong to the same animal as those of the Fossil 

 Elephant of Siberia; and the name of Mammoth, meaning "of the earth," 

 given to it by the Tartars, was applied to them, and generally used in 

 this country. Cuvier T having satisfied himself that they differed in many 

 respects from those of the elephant, designated the animal from the 

 form of its teeth; calling it Mastodon from two Greek words, fta<no S and 

 iSovi, nipple-tooth, or tooth with mammillated eminences. 



The great palaeontologist of France added the specific term Gigantcus ; 

 while others have employed, and sometimes he has himself, that of 

 OMoticus, as if this species belonged exclusively, or in a great measure, 

 to the State of Ohio. As four out of five of the known skeletons were 

 discovered in Orange County, New York, and the vicinity; and as great 

 numbers of bones have been and still continue to be exhumed in the 

 same district, it would have been quite as proper to have used that of 

 Aurantiacus or Eboracensis. Great numbers of Mastodon bones have been 

 also found at Big Bone Lick in Kentucky, in the States of Alabama, 

 Mississippi, and Missouri ; and there would therefore be an equal or greater 

 propriety in deriving a specific name from one of these States. But as 



