noun (plural elephants; also elephant)
Usage: often attributive
Etymology: Middle English, from Anglo-French & Latin; Anglo-French olifant, elefant, from L. elephantus, from Greek elephant-, elephas
Date: 14th century
any of a family (Elephantidae, the elephant family) of thickset usually extremely large nearly hairless herbivorous mammals that have a snout elongated into a muscular trunk and two incisors in the upper jaw developed especially in the male into large ivory tusks and that include two living forms and various extinct relatives: as, a tall large-eared mammal ( Loxodonta africana ) of tropical Africa, a relatively small-eared mammal ( Elephas maximus ) of forests of southeastern Asia, an animal or fossil related to the elephants, one that is uncommonly large or hard to manage
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