Freiburger historische Bestände - digital

EXPLANATION

OF

PLATE 24.

The two figures on this plate represent the skulls of a young and of a rather old specimen of the Indian
Elephant. The skulls were placed thus, that the basioccipitale had a horizontal position in both. The result
hereof is that the anterior tooth in fig. 2 has been extraordinarily shortened, the hard palate of this skull being
very oblique in comparison with the basioccipitale: the length of the grinding surface of that tooth is really
more than double the breadth, while in the figure the breadth appears as if it were greater than the length.
In the young specimen fig. 1 the hard palate and the grinding surface are much less oblique.

The figures well illustrate some of the enormous differences between the young skull and the old one:
notice the place, where the tympanohyal has been inserted in the young and in the older: in the young it is
not far from the lateral side of the skull, while in the older it is situated much nearer to the median plane
than to the lateral side of the skull; notice also the relatively large size of the tympanal bone in the young,
the prominent posterior part of the skull in the old, the large breadth of the posterior part in the same, etc.

Fig. 1. Skull of the specimen /).
2. k.