Camper (1722-1789) contrasted (1777) the Pleistocene and recent species of elephants and Blumenbach (1752-1840) separated (1780) the mammoth from the existing species as Elephas primigenius.
The elephant (Elephas indicus) is found in many parts of India, though not in the north-west.
This view may receive some support from the occurrence of a dwarf form of the African elephant in the Congo; and if we regard the latter as a subspecies of Elephas africanus, it seems highly probable that a similar position will have to be assigned to the pigmy European fossil elephants.
The Quaternary period includes an older stage containing fragments of fossils from the underlying formations; a later stage containing the bones of Hippopotamus, Elephas, Rhinoceros, Camelus, Equus; and finally the vast accumulations of sand which began to be formed in prehistoric times.
In 1793 Thomas Pennant (1726-1798) distinguished the American mastodon as Elephas americanus.