Right Member of a Pair of Architectural Reliefs with Elephants

One of a pair of architectural panels with relief decoration of an elephant. Both pieces are cut and chipped on their inner ends in such a way as to suggest that the elephants faced each other in an architectural setting. Small rectangular cut-away areas appear above the end of the trunk of each elephant. They stride across the panels with their trunks curled in a salute and with fringed ceremonial blankets on their backs. Incised crosshatching is used to convey the roughness of the hide.

The Romans admired the nobility of elephants. Pliny the Elder, writing around ad 77, stated that the elephant “approaches the nearest to man in intelligence” and “possesses notions of honesty, prudence, and equity.” The two elephants on these reliefs probably faced each other on a building or monument, supporting an arch or a lintel with their trunks.