If there were any contender for a real-life equivalent to the Oliphaunts of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth, it would be ...

The small tooth was discovered by Dorothea Bate around 1901 ... We are also collaborating with colleagues in Germany in the first ancient DNA study into the origins of Mediterranean dwarf elephants.

But the anatomical details of Phosphatherium fossils found in Morocco are clear that the small mammal shared some key traits in common with elephants to the exclusion of other mammals, such as ...