The following

elephant Elephants are the largest existing land animals. Three living species are currently recognised: the African bush elephant, the African forest elephant, and the Asian elephant. They are the only surviving members of the family Elephantidae an ...

s or elephant-like figures occur in mythology and religion.

Lists

Deities with elephant heads

Ganesh Ganesha ( sa, गणेश, ), also known as Ganapati, Vinayaka, and Pillaiyar, is one of the best-known and most worshipped Deva_(Hinduism), deities in the Hindu deities, Hindu pantheon and is the Supreme God in Ganapatya sect. His image is ...

, the famous Hindu deity. *

Malini Malini may refer to: People *Max Malini (1873–1942), magician * Malini Awasthi, Indian folk singer *Malini Fonseka (born 1947), Sri Lankan actress * Malini Gaud, Indian politician *Princess Malini Nobhadara (1885–1924) of Thailand * Malini Raj ...

, a goddess associated with the birth of

Ganesha Ganesha ( sa, गणेश, ), also known as Ganapati, Vinayaka, and Pillaiyar, is one of the best-known and most worshipped deities in the Hindu pantheon and is the Supreme God in Ganapatya sect. His image is found throughout India. Hindu d ...

Vinayaki Vinayaki (Vināyakī) is an elephant-headed Hindu goddess. Her mythology and iconography are not clearly defined. Little is told about her in Hindu scriptures and very few images of this deity exist.Mundkur p. 291 Due to her elephantine feature ...

, a Hindu goddess.

Mythological elephants

Airavata Indra (alias Sakra) and Shachi riding the five-headed Divine Elephant Airavata, Folio from a Jain text, Panch Kalyanaka">Shachi.html" ;"title="Indra (alias Sakra) and Shachi">Indra (alias Sakra) and Shachi riding the five-headed Divine Elepha ...

, an elephant ridden by the

Hindu Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism.Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...

god

Indra Indra (; Sanskrit: इन्द्र) is the king of the devas (god-like deities) and Svarga (heaven) in Hindu mythology. He is associated with the sky, lightning, weather, thunder, storms, rains, river flows, and war. volumes/ref> I ...

. * The eight

Ashtadiggajas Ashtadiggajas is the collective title given to the eight Telugu scholars and poets in the court of Emperor Krishnadevaraya who ruled the Vijayanagara Empire from 1509 until his death in 1529. During his reign, Telugu literature and culture re ...

s described as supporting the world in

Hindu cosmology Hindu cosmology is the description of the universe and its states of matter, cycles within time, physical structure, and effects on living entities according to Hindu texts. Hindu cosmology is also intertwined with the idea of a creator who allo ...

* Erawan, the

Thai Thai or THAI may refer to: * Of or from Thailand, a country in Southeast Asia ** Thai people, the dominant ethnic group of Thailand ** Thai language, a Tai-Kadai language spoken mainly in and around Thailand *** Thai script *** Thai (Unicode block ...

version of

Gajasura In Hindu epics, Gajasura ( sa, गजासुर, lit. "elephant demon") is a generic name given to an asura (demon), who assumes the form of an elephant. It may refer to demons: * killed by god Shiva: see Gajasurasamhara * killed by Shiva and his ...

, an elephant demon from

Hindu mythology Hindu mythology is the body of myths and literature attributed to, and espoused by, the adherents of the Hindu religion, found in Hindu texts such as the Vedic literature, epics like ''Mahabharata'' and ''Ramayana'', the Puranas, and reg ...

* Gajendra, from the

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...

text ''

Gajendra Moksha Gajendra Moksha ( sa, गजेन्द्रमोक्षः) or The Liberation of Gajendra is a Puranic legend from the 8th Skandha of the ''Bhāgavata Purāṇa'', a sacred text in Hinduism. It is one of the famous exploits of the preserver ...

'' * Girimekhala, the elephant that carries Mara in

Theravada Buddhism ''Theravāda'' () ( si, ථේරවාදය, my, ထေရဝါဒ, th, เถรวาท, km, ថេរវាទ, lo, ເຖຣະວາດ, pi, , ) is the most commonly accepted name of Buddhism's oldest existing school. The school' ...

Kasogonagá Kasogonagá (also spelled as Gasogonaga, Qasoxonaxa, and many other variations) is a Toba weather goddess. She appears to shamans Shamanism is a religious practice that involves a practitioner (shaman) interacting with what they believe to b ...

, a

Toba Toba may refer to: Languages * Toba Sur language, spoken in South America * Batak Toba, spoken in Indonesia People * Toba people, indigenous peoples of the Gran Chaco in South America * Toba Batak people, a sub-ethnic group of Batak people from ...

deity described as either an elephant or an anteater. * Supratika, a name for several elephants in Hindu mythology

Other instances

An elephant god doubtlessly existed in the

predynastic period Prehistoric Egypt and Predynastic Egypt span the period from the earliest human settlement to the beginning of the Early Dynastic Period around 3100 BC, starting with the first Pharaoh, Narmer for some Egyptologists, Hor-Aha for others, with th ...

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediter ...

, as indicated from the statuette of a man with the head of an elephant.

Jean Vercoutter Jean Vercoutter (20 January 1911 – 16 July 2000) was a French Egyptologist. One of the pioneers of archaeological research into Sudan from 1953, he was Director of the Institut Français d'Archéologie Orientale from 1977 to 1981. Biography Bo ...

discovered this in a temple in

Sudan Sudan ( or ; ar, السودان, as-Sūdān, officially the Republic of the Sudan ( ar, جمهورية السودان, link=no, Jumhūriyyat as-Sūdān), is a country in Northeast Africa. It shares borders with the Central African Republic t ...

Wad ban Naqa Wad ben Naga (also Wad Ban Naqa or Wad Naga) is the name of an ancient town of the Kushitic Kingdom of Meroë in present-day Sudan. The village lies on the eastern bank of the Nile, about 80 kilometers upstream of Meroë and about 40 km so ...

. In 1970, during the German expedition of

Musawwarat es-Sufra Musawwarat es-Sufra (Arabic: , Meroitic: Aborepi, Old Egyptian: jbrp, jpbr-ˁnḫ), also known as Al-Musawarat Al-Sufra, is a large Meroitic temple complex in modern Sudan, dating back to the early Meroitic period of the 3rd century BC. It is lo ...

at Sudan, graffito was found on the eastern outside wall of the Temple of Mut of an elephant-headed figure wearing a

sun disk A solar symbol is a symbol representing the Sun. Common solar symbols include circles (with or without rays), crosses, and spirals. In religious iconography, personifications of the Sun or solar attributes are often indicated by means of a hal ...

."Elephants In Ancient Egypt"
/ref>

References

{{Elephants E Lists of elephants

Lists

Deities with elephant heads

Mythological elephants

Other instances

See also

References