| ▲ | sonofhans 3 hours ago | |
Pure speculation, of course, but I would say so. The hump in the back; the small, high, tail; dominant forehead — those are all things missed by people who mis-draw elephants. I think this artist got them right, which is hard to do from description alone. | ||
| ▲ | bertil 2 hours ago | parent | next [-] | |
I’m very tempted to agree with you: people who draw from description draw unicorns after being told about rhinoceroses. We have a lot of medieval monks’ drawings of elephants by description and theirs look like tapir with a trumpet stuck in their nose. This is not a photo, of course but it mainly highlights the head, like any one would if they didn’t measured proportions carefully. | ||
| ▲ | beloch 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | |
There has also been debate about which species of elephant Hannibal's forces used. Elsewhere, Hellenistic Greek forces used Asian elephants, but many believe Hannibal used North African elephants, a sub-species that was extirpated by the Romans. Their proportions might have been a little different than living elephants. It will be interesting to see if the bone can help settle this debate. | ||