You will be redirected to OpenEdition Search. A review of elephant command words. The ability to keep and ride elephants changed the course of history. However, the origin of the art of elephant taming is shrouded in mystery.
We do not know when or where elephant culture originated or how it spread. Some clues come from the peculiar jargon that mahouts use to command elephants. Studying the variation of these command words may help reveal the origin of the art. The earliest evidence of the live capture of an elephant is from Egypt, ca.
However, taming of the African forest elephant, Loxodonta cyclotis, probably only began ca. In Asia, the elephant Elephas maximus was first captured ca. In Southeast Asia, elephant riding commenced ca. A converse view is that the art originated in China or Southeast Asia and then spread to India K ipling , A third possibility is that mahoutship commenced independently in more than one location. One particular aspect of the language of elephant culture is its command words.
These words are one of three means used to direct elephants, along with touch and gesture R ensch , Elephants remember tone, melody, and phonological form, allowing them to recognise more than 20 verbal commands E dgerton , ; R ensch , This peculiarity often points to the antiquity of the jargons J enner , As a result, similarities in elephant command words are thought to point to historical connections between elephant cultures C rawfurd , ; K urt , ; K urt et al.
However, very limited etymological work has been done in this regard Z velebil , I made a focused search on South Asia and Southeast Asia. Particularly helpful was an unpublished compilation of nine commands in 10 Asian languages presented by German veterinarian and elephant expert Fred Kurt at the European Elephant Management School K urt , Similarly helpful was the compilation made by Schliesinger of 10 commands in four Southeast Asian languages S chliesinger , My analysis included 20 lexicons.
