Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Any of several very large, extinct proboscidian mammals of the family Mammutidae of the Miocene, Pliocene, and Pleistocene Epochs, resembling elephants but having molar teeth of a different structure.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun An extinct proboscidean quadruped of the family Elephantidæ and subfamily Mastodontinæ.
- noun [capitalized] The typical genus of Mastodontinæ, formerly held to include all the mastodons, now restricted to those of the tetralophodont series, such as M. avernensis of Europe.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Paleon.) An extinct genus of mammals closely allied to the elephant, but having less complex molar teeth, and often a pair of lower, as well as upper, tusks, which are incisor teeth. The species were mostly larger than elephants, and their remains occur in nearly all parts of the world in deposits ranging from Miocene to late Quaternary time.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Extinct
elephant -like mammal of the genusMammut thatflourished worldwide fromMiocene throughPleistocene times; differs fromelephants andmammoths in the form of the molar teeth.
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun extinct elephant-like mammal that flourished worldwide from Miocene through Pleistocene times; differ from mammoths in the form of the molar teeth
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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"You wouldn't have us call a mastodon like that Fanny, would you, or Tatters?"
A House-Boat on the Styx John Kendrick Bangs 1892
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A mastodon is the more amazing animal too, isn't it?
More fisheying the Museum of Natural History. Ann Althouse 2008
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The mastodon was a relatively squat creature, standing certainly four feet shorter than the imperial elephant, with comparatively small and slightly curved tusks and a flatter head.
VIII. Primeval Man; and the Horse, the Lion, and the Elephant 1916
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The mastodon was a giant elephant of a still earlier period than the mammoth.
Some Reminiscences of old Victoria Edgar Fawcett 1885
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Workers started by removing the front and hind legs from the mastodon, which is supported by a steel bracket.
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The mastodon was a contemporary of saber-toothed cats.
dispatch.com: RSS John Switzer 2010
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Manny - otherwise known as the mastodon voiced by Ray Romano - is trying to start a family.
unknown title 2009
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Instead of a lower jaw a foot long, as in an elephant or in the common kind of mastodon -- this long-jawed kind had a lower jaw 5 feet or 6 feet long!
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It appears that he slew also a notable dun cow, of a kind of mastodon breed, which prevailed in those early days, which was making great havoc in the neighborhood.
Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands, Volume 1 Harriet Beecher Stowe 1853
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"A mastodon is a much older species, a third cousin once removed.
chained_bear commented on the word mastodon
Mastodons "resembled, but were distinct from, the woolly mammoth, which belongs to the family Elephantidae. Mastodons were browsers, while mammoths were grazers." (Wikipedia)
September 4, 2008