Surus was supposedly the name of the last war elephant of Carthaginian general Hannibal Barca's army in Italy. Several Roman writers give accounts of Surus, which was probably a large Asian elephant with one tusk. According to some accounts, the animal was the last of the 37 war elephants Hannibal took with him on his crossing of the Alps, during the Second Punic War. Surus supposedly served as a platform for Hannibal, who had difficulties overlooking the battlefield after losing one eye from an infection.
According to Plautus, Surus wore a red cloth, and may also have carried a red shield and a howdah (a construction on the animal's back).
John M. Kistler, War Elephants (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2006), 122-123 Richard A. Gabriel, "Hannibal: The Military Biography of Rome's Greatest Enemy" (Potomac Books, 2011), 33