"The Buried Classic" from Ancient Greece, and the roots of the Western World .... The Life of Apollonius of Tyana Philostratus {220 AD} The Tusks of the Elephant: A Story from Juba - Ancient Sovereign of Libya
Web Publication by Mountain Man Graphics, Australia in the Southern Spring of 1995

Of the Tusks of the Elephant - A Story from Juba, ancient sovereign of Libya ...

This Juba is of opinion that the tusks are horns, because they grow just where the temples are, and because they need no sharpening of any kind, and remain as they grew and do not, like teeth, fall out and then grow afresh.

But I cannot accept this view; for horns, if not all, at any reate those of stags, do fall out and grow afresh, but the teeth, although in the case of men those which may fall out, will in every case grow again, on the other hand there is not a single animal whose tusk or dog-tooth falls out naturally, nor in which, when it has fallen out, it will come again. For nature implants these tusks in their jaws for the sake of defence. And moreover, a circular ridge is formed year by year at the base of the horns, as we see in the case of goats and sheep and oxen; but a tusk grows out quite smooth, and unless something breaks it, it always reminas so, for it consists of a material and substance as hard as stone.

Morever the carrying of horns is confined to animals with cloven hoofs, but this animal has five nails and the sole of his foot has many furrows in it, and not being confined by hoofs, it seems to stand on a soft, flabby foot.

And in the case of all animals that have horns, nature supplies cavernous bones and causes the horn to grow from outwards, whereas she makes the elephant tusk full and equally massive throughtout; and when in the lathe you lay bare the interior, you find a very thin tube piercing the centre of it, as is the case with teeth.

Now the tusks of the marsh elephants are dark in colour and porous and difficult to work, because they are hollowed out into many cavities, and often knots are formed in them which oppose difficulties to the craftsman's tool; but the tusks of the mountain kind, though smaller than these, are very white and there is nothing about them difficult to work; but best of all are the tusks of the elephants of the plain, for these are very large and very white and so pleasant to turn and carve that the hand can shape them into whatever it likes.

If I may also describe the characters of these elephants; those which come from the marshes, and are taken there, are considered to be stupid and idle by the Indians; but those which come from the mountains they regard as wicked and treacherous and, unless they want something, not to be relied upon by man; but the elephants of the plain are said to be good and tractable, and fond of learning tricks; for they will write and dance, and will sway themselves to and fro and leap up and down from the ground to the sound of the flute.

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"The Buried Classic" from Ancient Greece, and the roots of the Western World .... The Life of Apollonius of Tyana Philostratus {220 AD} The Tusks of the Elephant: A Story from Juba - Ancient Sovereign of Libya
Web Publication by Mountain Man Graphics, Australia in the Southern Spring of 1995