Talk:List of historical elephants

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Including Joseph Merrick on a "List of famous elephants" is completely repulsive. Merrick was a man. He suffered from proteus syndrome. Yes, he was called "The Elephant" man by a circus promoter, but there was nothing elephant about him. Kingturtle 00:53 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)

Does Snuffelufucus count as a fictional elephant? If so, how do you actually spell it? His history is actually interesting in that he stopped being an imaginary friend to Big Bird because it was confusing to kids and considered educationally unsound. Danny

His name is Aloysius Snuffleupagus. I don't think he's supposed to be an elephant though... just an elephant-like creature. -- goatasaur
he is elephant-like, but has no tusks. and i liked him better when he was bigbird's imaginary friend. alas. Kingturtle 01:00 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)
"Fictional elephant-like things" heaheahaeaaaheeahah!!!! Kingturtle 01:04 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)

But seriously, are Oliphant and Oliphaunt different or the same? Kingturtle 01:22 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)

Oliphant the Elephant is a song on a Tiny Tim album. And it's about an elephant. Actually, a google search only shows 5 matches so I guess it's not that famous. Perhaps it should be struck off the list. -Nommo
We could make a new article called "List of elephants that weren't famous until their names appeared on this list of elephants that weren't famous until their names appeared on this list." or....we could just keep Oliphant the Elephant on this current article. Kingturtle 01:28 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)
I like the former. -Nommo

A question for the ages: was Snorky an elephant, or an elephant-like thing?!?!?! -- Someone else 02:09 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)

Look here [1] . now you tell me. Kingturtle 02:11 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)
That's a simplified Snorky!!! The Snorky I remember had the typical "Kroft" feather-hair all over, and I'm not sure he was grey. I'll look for a genuine Snorky ref<G>. -- Someone else 02:17 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)
on the basis of this photo I'm prepared to concede that Snorky is [1] mostly grey and [2] a fictional elephant rather than merely elephant-like. But it's close<G>! -- Someone else 02:20 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)
it never occurred to me before, but what exactly are the other animals represented in the Banana splits? Kingturtle 02:23 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)
Well, one's an ape of some sort, but beyond that I'd say all bets are off... Would you believe dog, lion, gorilla, elephant? -- Someone else 02:25 Apr 14, 2003 (UTC)

Restoring full list of elephants. There's no need to delete fictional elephants from this list. Also reclassifying some in terms of "fiction". -- Someone else 00:31 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I did not delete fictional elephants -- I moved them to List of fictional elephants. -- Timwi 01:01 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)
You deleted them from the list of famous elephants, copied them to the list of fictional elephants, and then renamed this page to list of historical elephants, in the process misclassifying several. See Talk:List of fictional elephants. The things listed here are alike in being elephants, which is a more important reason for them to classify them together than being fictional or non-fictional is for them to be separated. -- Someone else 01:07 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)
How does this argument not apply to all the other animals? -- Timwi 01:13 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)
It does. It's silly to have separate lists for "fiction" and "non-fiction": the lists combined are not too long for a single article, and there's no benefit to having them on separate pages. -- Someone else 01:16 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)
Point taken. Although I'd really rather wait for more people to voice their opinions, I won't stop you if you wish to combine all of the fictional and non-fictional lists. I don't have strong feelings about combining or separating them; I only strive to achieve consistency. -- Timwi 01:25 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)
P.S. I'm going to bed, so you're on your own :-)))))) -- Timwi 01:25 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)
I'm more than willing to listen to other voices of reason on the subject. Consistency is fine, but it's clear to me that one of the (relatively few <G>) justifications for lists like this is seeing things in interesting juxtapositions, which is defeated by separating them. -- Someone else 02:23 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Please have a look at the title-change discussion at Talk:List_of_historical_animals#Historical or Historic ?. Not many seem to have that page in their watchlist. Jay 21:08, 14 Jan 2004 (UTC)

I plan to remove the word "historical" from the article name. See Talk:List_of_historical_animals for further discussion. Jay 08:39, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Hannibal's army of war elephants

  1. Two separate descriptions were made into one.
  2. The Latin word "Suros" was changed to a more orthographic form --Surus--.

Toby (YebisYa) IQUEPPE 18:36, 2004 Nov 23 (UTC)

[edit] Please add Packy!!!

I really think that the Oregon Zoo's Packy should be on the list, as he was the first elephant born in the Western Hemisphere for many decades, and the first in a 'modern zoo'. CFLeon 01:26, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for your suggestion! When you feel an article needs improvement, please feel free to make those changes. Wikipedia is a wiki, so anyone can edit almost any article by simply following the Edit this page link at the top. You don't even need to log in (although there are many reasons why you might want to). The Wikipedia community encourages you to be bold in updating pages. Don't worry too much about making honest mistakes — they're likely to be found and corrected quickly. If you're not sure how editing works, check out how to edit a page, or use the sandbox to try out your editing skills. New contributors are always welcome. -- ALoan (Talk) 09:29, 3 August 2006 (UTC)
I would have, but there's a lock on the article that prevents it being edited. CFLeon 22:29, 3 August 2006 (UTC)
I'm not entirely sure why full protection was necessary (there was not that much Colbert vandalism) but it is now semi-protected, if that helps. -- ALoan (Talk) 22:45, 3 August 2006 (UTC)
"Colbert vandalism?" CFLeon 06:29, 8 August 2006 (UTC)
See Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2006-08-07/Wikiality. -- ALoan (Talk) 10:42, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Separate lists?

Would it perhaps be a good idea to split this list into two subsections by Asian & African? CFLeon 06:29, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Execution?

Is it really correct to refer to the "execution" of elephants who were responsible for the deaths of their keepers? Surely "put to death" or "euthanized" are more appropriate? --ukexpat 18:59, 6 August 2007 (UTC)

'Euthanized' has a completely different intended meaning. 'Put to death' may be appropriate, but awlfully wordy and also gives the impression of just being shot. What is the problem with 'execution? However unfair, or politically non-correct it may be nowadays, that was certainly the intent at the time by the people involved. What's unusual was the method of hanging, rather that just being shot. CFLeon 03:32, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
  • If the intent is clearly punitive or vengeful, then "execution" is accurate. If the intent is unclear or controversial, "killed" would probably suffice. --Dystopos 03:56, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Tyke

Was Tyke marrying Dallas Beckwith or was Allen marrying Dallas Beckwith? 71.68.15.63 13:38, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Salt and Sauce

These two elephants were perhaps the most famous elephants in British history. I have added them since creating the article. - Byshee