Elephants in ancient China Elephants in ancient China The existence of elephants in ancient China is attested both by archaeological evidence and by depictions in Chinese artwork. Long thought to belong to an extinct subspecies of Asian elephants, named "Elephas maximus rubridens", they lived in Central and Southern China before the 14th century BC. They once occurred as far north as Anyang, Henan in northern China. The elephant is mentioned in the earliest received texts, including the "Shijing", "Liji", and "Zuozhuan." The oracle bone script and bronzeware script glyphs for elephant are pictographic depictions of an animal with a long trunk. Their modern descendant
Perry Mastodon when the school was seeking to change its mascot. Perry Mastodon also inspired a song called "Perry, the Mastodon" by college campus band, The Two Twangs. The mastodon has been the victim of many pranks over the years. The most legendary occurred on Parents' Day 1975, when a bogus tape recording was inserted in place of the true story of the Mastodon. This prank was written up in the 1976 yearbook, the school newspaper, the Wheaton Daily Journal, and the official history of the college by Paul Bechtel. Perry Mastodon Perry Mastodon (sometimes called "Perry, the Mastodon") is the name