Deinotherium, also called the Hoe tusker, was a gigantic prehistoric relative of modern-day elephants that appeared in the Middle Miocene and continued until the Early Pleistocene. During that time it changed very little. In life it probably resembled modern elephants, except that its trunk was shorter, and it had downward curving tusks attached to the lower jaw. Deinotherium is the third largest land mammal known to have existed; only Paraceratherium and Mammuthus sungari were larger, although Mammuthus imperator may have rivaled it in size. Males were generally between 3.5 and 4.5 meters (12 and 15 feet) tall at the shoulders although large specimens may have been up to 5m (16ft). Their weight is estimated to have been between 5 and 10 tonnes (5.5 and 11 US Standard tons), with the largest males weighing in excess of 14 tonnes (15.4 US Standard tons). Deinotherium's range covered parts of Asia, Africa, and Europe. Adrienne Mayor, in The First Fossil Hunters: Paleontology In Greek and Roman Times, has suggested that Deinothere fossils found in Greece helped generate myths of archaic giant beings.

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