Fig. 11.—Mastodon’s Tooth (worn). (After Figuier.)
Cuvier established the name Mastodon,[51] or teat-like toothed animals, for the gigantic species from America which Buffon had already described under the name of the animal or elephant of the Ohio.
Fig. 12.—Mastodon’s Tooth. (After Figuier.)
The form first appears in the Upper Miocene of Europe, five species being known, two of them from Pikermi, near Athens, and one, M. angustidens, from the Miocene beds of Malta. Mastodon remains have also been found in the beds of the Sivalik hills, and four species of mastodon in all are known to have ranged over India during those periods.
In Pliocene deposits we have abundant remains of M. arvernensis, and M. longirostris from the Val d’Arno in Italy, and the M. Borsoni from central France.
The M. arvernensis may be considered as a characteristic Pliocene species in Italy, France, and Europe generally. In Britain it occurs in the Norwich Crag and the Red Crag of Suffolk.
Species of mastodon occur in the Pliocene of La Plata, and of the temperate regions of South America; on the Pampas, and in the Andes of Chili.
The Mastodon mirificus of Leidy is the earliest known species in America; this occurs in Pliocene deposits on the Niobrara and the Loup fork, west of the Mississippi.
The remains of the Mastodon americanus of Cuvier occur abundantly in the Post Pliocene deposits throughout the United States, but more especially in the northern half; they are also found in Canada and Nova Scotia.