Back فيل سوري Arabic فيل سورى ARZ Сирийски слон Bulgarian Elephas maximus asurus Catalan Elephas maximus asurus Spanish فیل سوری Persian Sýriskur fílur Faeroese Elefante sirio Galician פיל סורי HE Szíriai elefánt Hungarian
| Syrian elephant Temporal range: Holocene
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| Skull from Gavur Lake Swamp, Turkey | |
Scientific classification 
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| Domain: | Eukaryota |
| Kingdom: | Animalia |
| Phylum: | Chordata |
| Class: | Mammalia |
| Order: | Proboscidea |
| Family: | Elephantidae |
| Genus: | Elephas |
| Species: | |
| Subspecies: | †E. m. asurus
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| Trinomial name | |
| †Elephas maximus asurus Deraniyagala, 1950[1]
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The Syrian or Western Asiatic elephant (sometimes given the subspecies designation Elephas maximus asurus) was the westernmost population of the Asian elephant (Elephas maximus), which went extinct in ancient times, with early human civilizations in the area utilizing the animals for their ivory, and possibly for warfare.[2] Skeletal remains of E. m. asurus have been recorded in the Middle East, notably from Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey, from periods dating between at least 1800 BC and likely 700 BC.[3] Due to the lack of any Late Pleistocene or early to mid-Holocene records for Asian elephants in the region, there are suggestions that the elephants were anthropogenically introduced, or transported, there during the Bronze Age,[3] though this is disputed.[4]
Ancient Syrian and Assyrian craftsmen used the tusks of E. m. asurus to make ivory carvings. Regionally, the production of ivory items was at its height during the first millennium, BC, when the Arameans crafted splendid ivory inlays for elite furniture.
- ^ Deraniyagala, P. E. P. (1951). "Elephas maximus, the elephant od Ceylon". Spolie Zeylanica. 26: 161. ISSN 0081-3745.
- ^ Choudhury, A.; Lahiri Choudhury, D. K.; Desai, A.; Duckworth, J. W.; Easa, P. S.; Johnsingh, A. J. T.; Fernando, P.; Hedges, S.; Gunawardena, M.; Kurt, F.; Karanth, U; Lister, A.; Menon, V.; Riddle, H.; Rübel, A. & Wikramanayake, E. (IUCN SSC Asian Elephant Specialist Group) (2008). "Elephas maximus". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. 2008: e.T7140A12828813.
{{cite journal}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link) - ^ a b Çakırlar, Canan; Ikram, Salima (2016-05-03). "'When elephants battle, the grass suffers.' Power, ivory and the Syrian elephant". Levant. 48 (2): 167–183. doi:10.1080/00758914.2016.1198068. ISSN 0075-8914.
- ^ Pfälzner, Peter (2016-12-01). "The Elephants of the Orontes". Syria (IV): 159–182. doi:10.4000/syria.5002. ISSN 0039-7946.