128 
BRITISH FOSSIL ELEPHANTS. 
Cranial contour. — Conjointly these foregoing characters are fairly distinctive of the 
Mammoth (PI. YI, figs. 1 and 1 a), and broadly so as compared with the short-crowned 
Elephants, such as the African species, and seemingly E. meridionalis , an entire skull of 
Elephas antiquus not being known ; but the crania of certain Sewalik Proboscidea, to wit, 
E. planifrons (African-like ?), E. insignis, E. bombifrons, as far as their fossil remains permit 
one to judge, were very different from the long-crowned Mammoth and Asiatic Elephant, 
to which E. Hgsudricus, with its distorted (? deformed) forehead, might be added. 
Consequent on these short and long cranial vaults the length from the vertex to the 
extremities of the premaxillaries, as compared with the breadth of the forehead at the 
post-orbital processes, varies considerably. Cuvier estimated the measurements in the two 
recent species as 5 to 3 in the Asiatic, and 3 to 2 in the African, and these appear to me 
from various measurements to be pretty general. The skull of the Mammoth agrees 
with the former, whilst according to Falconer and Nesti, that of E. meridionalis seems to 
come closer to the latter. No skull of E. antiquus being, as far as I know, yet described, 
we can only make comparisons with its very close Eastern representative, E. Namadicus. 
Supposing the extraordinary frontal rim of its calvarium in the British Museum 1 2 was 
absolutely of the character and extent shown in the specimen, and not the result of 
pressure or injuries after death, there never would be much likelihood of confounding it 
with the above, or in fact any other known proboscidean. 
The configuration of the vertex and degrees of depression, flatness, and convexity of 
the forehead seem to differ widely in different species of Elephant. 
The vertex in the Mammoth rises high, like that of the Asiatic Elephant, but it is 
decidedly narrower, and the pronounced depression in the recent species is not apparently 
so deep in the Mammoth. This is well seen in PL VII, figs. 1 and 1 a , and also in a cast 
of a nearly entire cranium from Brussels, in the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons, 
London. 3 In E. meridionalis, according to Nesti, and as stated by Falconer, the posterior 
border of the vertex is transverse, the occipital fossa, of which the depression is the upper 
termination, being over-reached by a produced fold of the vertex. 3 The so-called “ bonnet¬ 
shaped summit ” of the cranium of E. Namadicus just noticed is still more peculiar, whilst 
the broad circular crown of the African distinguishes it from any of the foregoing, and 
assimilates its characters rather with E. planifrons and E. bombifrons. 
Frontal depression. —The Mammoth’s skull presents a slight depression or concavity 
of the forehead, with a small prominence above it. This is very evident in the Brussels 
skull, and although the part is somewhat injured in that from Ilford (PI. VII, fig- 1) h 
1 ‘ Fauna Antiqua Sival.,’ pis. 12 b and 24 a. 
2 A well-preserved cranium of the Mammoth is very rare considering the enormous quantities of its 
teeth and bones discovered throughout Europe. Dr. Falconer (1865) knew of only one entire specimen 
out of Russia. Besides that, two nearly entire skeletons in the Royal Museum of Brussels, a skull of which 
is here referred to, and the Rford cranium, pis. YI and VII, are the only instances known to me. 
s 1 Pal. Mem.,’ vol. ii, p, 122. 
