Comments on: Emela-Ntouka: Killer of Elephants

By: crypto_randz

crypto_randz — Sun, 10 Dec 2006 14:45:26 +0000

What a great subject back to the dinosaur ages, this story has always intrigued me. In my opinion, the animal may be a cousin to the rhino but I’m leaning towards a descendant of the triceratops perhaps a new specie of triceratops. The thing that has always amazed me about the Congo region is how these animals are so elusive. The Congo is so very large. I have looked at various maps of the Congo region, it’s a perfect place for dinosaurs to roam.

By: kamoeba

kamoeba — Fri, 08 Dec 2006 03:47:52 +0000

When I was a kid in the days before VHS and DVD, there was nothing better than catching a 50’s or 60’s Japanese monster movie on TV (especially if I got to stay up past bedtime to watch). After watching the movies I’d often draw the monster(s) I’d seen. Looking back on these 30-year-old drawings, I made a lot of mistakes. My drawings were generally recognizable as the monsters I’d watched, but they often had major mistakes/omissions/changes in the finer details. I’m sure that if I was 7 years old today and watched the same movies with the benefit of crisp DVD picture, pause, slo-mo, access to monster photos on the internet and so forth, my drawings would be much more detailed and accurate. My guess is that the person who carved this piece had never seen the beast in question and had probably heard about it from more than one unreliable source (and these sources in turn were perhaps merely passing a description without ever having seen the creature). If this creature does exist, I would think that it’s possible it may look drastically differnt from this sculpture.

By the way, I recently caught a few minutes of a nature special about elephants killing rhinos. The program showed of dead rhinos that had been killed by elephants. The theory is that when elephants reach maturation, they rut. During this phase the males become agressive and territorial, especially if they have matured at a younger-than-usual age. This is not to say that all male elephants in this phase go out and attack rhinos. It doesn’t seem logical, but it still does happen occasionally. The reason I mention this is because there are some posts in this thread that wonder why an Emela-Ntouka would bother to kill an elephant. I’m not saying it’s for the same reason an elephant would kill a rhino, I’m saying that to us it seems as illogical as an elephant killing a rhino…an event proven to occur.

As far as dinosaurs surviving in the Congo…if they’re there, I’m sure they leave plenty of physical evidence. There just aren’t that many people around that area to find the evidence. A part of me is also skeptical, but then there’s that darn coelacanth…

By: skeptik

skeptik — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 21:44:32 +0000

Maybe they were pot-belly elephants?

By: pbro

pbro — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 08:58:30 +0000

For one thing, the tail makes no sense for aquatic occupations when appended to the body we see represented, as the musculature and form of the Body would have no way to make use of the tail for propulsion, which the tail’s shape suggests it would be used/adapted for.

And, as a tail otherwise, it has an improbable shape and length for this body regardless of purported use…

This does seem like a composite, and a contrived carving/representation to me.

For this creature to ‘kill’ Elephants, one would think it would have to do so on dry land. And, if it is supposedly an aqautic creature, what motive or reason would it have to do so?

If is were to attack Elephants in rivers which elephants only occasionally or carefully would have much to do with anyway, it still makes no sense to me.

Certainly not be ‘killing’ Elephants to eat them, and, as Elephants are Herbivorous, Elephants, in aquatic or more arid contexts, are hardly a threat to anyone or anyone’s vulnerable young, which would invite agressive acts of defense, so…

Maybe a figurative attribution to what seems at best, is a very doubtful probability of creature.

By: Bob Michaels

Bob Michaels — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 04:26:27 +0000

Could be a Chipekwe? A type of Stegosaur? More likely a type of water rhino.

By: vet72

vet72 — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 01:17:35 +0000

Has anyone other than the natives in the northwest region of the Likoula Swamp actually witness this “creature” kill an elephant. It would be interesting to see the kind of bodily damage on a an elephant supposedly killed by one of these. There are very few animals that can kill an elephant other than another elephant and of course man. A creature capable of such power is quite interesting to say the least.

By: SageBrush

SageBrush — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 21:15:18 +0000

I keep on looking at the tail, and although it looks reptilian (fat, 3 dimensional, crocodile-like) in the drawing, if you look more closely at the sculpture, it appears to be quite flat. Granted, we have only one perspective, but it looks very two dimensional, as if it were just a skin flap. If this is so, it would seem the purpose of the tail is to dissipate heat in the same way the enlarged ears would, and not aquatic navigation, since it does not seem to have the muscle mass needed.

If the tail is just a mass of skin, like the ears, it would seem the animal is mammalian. If its body mass is much larger than a rhinoceros’s (say, closer to that of an elephant’s), the more skin surface area, the better.

I do wonder how it manages to keep from tripping over such a *long* tail, though. If this is a real animal, I’d think the tail would either be no longer than the legs, or held aloft. If it’s semi-aquatic, the water would hold the tail up, but then, considering the lack of muscle, what is the purpose of the tail? A decoy for crocs? Display?

By: zogarma

zogarma — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 19:29:06 +0000

Similar carving here.

By: busterggi

busterggi — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 15:59:57 +0000

The whole surviving African dinosaurs issue is something I’m completely skeptical about.

Large animals still need sufficient numbers to maintain a breeding population. They also leave lots of physical evidence like trackways, broken plants/trees. And they eat a lot.

So where is the physical evidence for these African beasties? No tracks, no areas of obvious grazing, no skeletal remains.

Nope, I don’t buy them. Maybe a dwarf forest elephant but not a dinosaur.

By: jinxstarr

jinxstarr — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 15:37:08 +0000

I agree with the composite theory.

However, as most all things do, I would imagine that any surviving sauropods, cerapods, whatever, would also have evolved over the centuries changing and distorting many recognizable features of their fossil brethren.

As to the ears, maybe they’re not actual ears at all but rather a frill that has adapted to it’s environment and lifestyle. Like the frilled lizard in Australia, being able to lift and lower it. Or maybe, if it’s become obsolete as it was, it’s simply become limp and protects the vulnerable neck.

The tail would make perfect since if the creature has adapted to aquatic life.

Being an Elephant killer wouldn’t necessarily make it carnivorous in any way. Herbivores kill in defense every day but don’t eat the victim.

A Triceratops, for example, may lose it’s head horns and develop a much larger nose horn as it evolves. It was known to have had a sort of beak (not unlike the odd snout on the statue) and teeth. It had a similar tail in length and proportion and may well have developed an aquatic edge to it over time, if it has taken to the water. Being very similar to Rhinos, it would likely have poor eyesight which may lead to more aggression. It would likely have gotten smaller over time but still be quite large compared Rhinos and Hippos.

Just my thoughts
I’ve been reading here for a long time now but have just started commenting. Thanks so much for having this wonderful site and for allowing me to be a part of it
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