Palaeoloxodon

Palaeoloxodon is an extinct genus of elephant. It originated in Africa during the Early Pleistocene, and expanded into Eurasia at the beginning of the Middle Pleistocene. Palaeoloxodon contains the largest known species of elephants, with mature bulls over tall at the shoulders and over in weight, representing among the largest land mammals ever, including the African Palaeoloxodon recki, the European straight-tusked elephant (Palaeoloxodon antiquus) and the South Asian Palaeoloxodon namadicus. P. namadicus has been suggested to be the largest known land mammal by some authors based on extrapolation from fragmentary remains, though these estimates are highly speculative. In contrast, the genus also contains many species of dwarf elephants (an example of insular dwarfism) on islands in the Mediterranean, some like Palaeoloxodon falconeri less than in shoulder height as fully grown adults, making them the smallest elephants known. The genus has a long and complex taxonomic history, and at various times, it has been considered to belong to Loxodonta or Elephas, but today is usually considered a valid and separate genus in its own right.

==History of research and taxonomy== Remains of Palaeoloxodon species have probably been noted since ancient times where their remains like those of other fossil proboscideans were interpreted as those of giants or other mythical beings. In 1695, remains of a straight-tusked elephant were collected from travertine deposits near Burgtonna in what is now Thuringia, Germany. While these remains were originally declared by the Collegium Medicum in the nearby city of Gotha to be purely mineral in nature, Wilhelm Ernst Tentzel, a polymath in the employ of the ducal court of Saxe-Gotha-Altenburg, correctly recognised that they represented the remains of an elephant. Prior to 1845, the remains of Eurasian species of Palaeoloxodon were considered to be those of woolly mammoths. The earliest species of Palaeoloxodon to be described, the European straight-tusked elephant (Palaeoloxodon antiquus) and the South Asian Palaeoloxodon namadicus, were named by British paleontologists Hugh Falconer and Proby Cautley in 1846-47. Prior to the description of the genus, Palaeoloxodon species were initially placed in the genus Elephas (which includes the Asian elephant).