Deinotheres are extinct, but are in the same group as modern elephants.

Meaning of scientific name
"terrible beast"

Pronunciation of scientific name
dy-noh-THEER-ee-um

Statistics
Males 4m at the shoulder, females 3.5m.

Physical description
Deinotherium looked a bit like an enormous elephant with downwards-curving tusks in the lower jaw rather than in the upper as in elephants. They also had a short trunk, a less-domed skull and longer legs.

Distribution
Deinotherium remains - particularly their tusks and teeth - have been found at all the major excavation sites in East Africa where hominids have been found, including Hadar, Laetoli, Olduvai Gorge and Lake Turkana.

Habitat
They inhabited the patchy savannah-land of Africa.

Diet
They browsed vegetation and stripped bark.

Behaviour
Wear marks on the tusks of Deinotherium suggest that they were probably used for stripping tree bark.

Conservation status
Extinct.

History
They lived 20-2 million years ago. The deinotheres are little-known gigantic cousins of the elephants, which flourished at the time of Australopithecus.