[HN Gopher] Archaeologists find possible first direct evidence o...
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Archaeologists find possible first direct evidence of Hannibal's
war elephants
Author : bryanrasmussen
Score : 63 points
Date : 2026-02-19 18:31 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.smithsonianmag.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.smithsonianmag.com)
| bryanrasmussen wrote:
| original title: Archaeologists Unearthed a 2,200-Year-Old Bone.
| They Say It Could Be the First Direct Evidence of Hannibal's
| Legendary War Elephants
| sickofparadox wrote:
| At this rate, we're only a few years away from discovering
| evidence for Herodotus' giant ants.
| shakna wrote:
| Peissel claimed that was marmots and totally real, didn't they?
| Telemakhos wrote:
| The anthill garnet is mined by ants on a Navajo reservation.
|
| https://columbiagemhouse.com/pages/anthill-garnet
|
| https://myeldesign.com/blogs/journal/the-fabulous-story-of-a...
| HelloUsername wrote:
| Related: "Single bone in Spain offers first direct evidence of
| Hannibal's war elephants"
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46917005 06-feb-2026 40
| comments
| shevy-java wrote:
| > A second-century Roman mosaic of a war elephant in Tunisia
|
| It is quite interesting to see that the depicted elephant has
| wrong proportions. This makes one wonder whether the artist who
| created that mosaic, ever saw an elephant himself.
| drekipus wrote:
| Wrong to elephants today
| sonofhans wrote:
| 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 wrote:
| 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 wrote:
| 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.
| inglor_cz wrote:
| Might be a limitation of the medium. Mosaics are complicated.
|
| This famous "skeleton" mosaic has the proportions wrong as
| well, even though the artist almost certainly saw some actual
| human skeletons, and definitely some living humans with their
| longer arms and smaller heads than depicted :)
|
| https://www.thehistoryblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Ha...
| __alexander wrote:
| Everyone should visit Cordoba, Spain once in their life.
| rrr_oh_man wrote:
| why?
| inglor_cz wrote:
| The mosque-turned-cathedral is an interesting (and huge)
| piece of medieval architecture.
|
| The Roman bridge is fascinating as well.
|
| Plus, if you arrive in summer, you will learn what _heat_ is.
| Cordoba is hot even for the standards of Spanish summers.
| Hence, interesting night life. Not just drunkards, normal
| families and everyone who barely survived the day and now has
| the opportunity to live and socialize outside.
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(page generated 2026-02-19 23:00 UTC)