Elephas beyeri is an extinct species of Elephantidae known from the Middle Pleistocene of the Philippines.
Description
The type specimen of the species is a partial cheek tooth from the lower jaw that has since been lost
. It has often been suggested that
Elephas beyeri was a
dwarf elephant with an estimated stature of in shoulder height, based on the assumption that the tooth represents a molar.
However, a 2025 conference abstract suggested that the tooth may represent a
Deciduous teeth fourth
premolar instead, which if true would place the idea that
E. beyeri represents a dwarf elephant into doubt.
[M.U. Tablizo, G.D. van den Bergh, and A.G.S. Fernando Revisiting the Pleistocene elephant fossils from Luzon island, Philippines: Elephas, Palaeoloxodon or Mammuthus? (2025) 5th Palaeontological Virtual Congress p. 80]
Taxonomy
During its naming, von Koenigswald proposed that
E. beyeri was descended from
Elephas namadicus (now generally placed in
Palaeoloxodon).
It was thought by von Koenigswald that these animals crossed from the mainland Asia to the Philippines via land bridge connecting with Taiwan. This, however, is still debated but a research in 2021 showed an evidence of the possibility.
Aside from the missing initial specimen, more elephantid remains were unearthed in 2001 in the same locality.
Further elephant remains were found in the
Visayas and at a number of sites in
Luzon, particularly the
Cagayan Valley region in the northern part of the island. But it is unclear if these belonged to
E. beyeri or
E. namadicus due to their fragmented nature and the missing holotype. It might be even argued that the Visayan fossils were different from the elephant species harbored in Greater Luzon.
A 2025 conference abstract found that based on analysis of archival data, the holotype and only undoubted
E. beyeri specimen does not have any synapomorphies of
Palaeoloxodon, and suggested that it could potentially have
mammoth affinities instead due to its tooth morphology resembling those of mammoths, but the authors advised against reclassifying the species, given the loss of the holotype specimen. The authors suggested that other remains of elephants found on Luzon and surrounding islands (with the Cagayan Valley material dating to the late Early Pleistocene, sometime between around 1.7 and 0.8 million years ago) could probably relatively confidently placed in
Elephas, the genus of the living
Asian elephant, and belonged to relatively large animals with cheek teeth roughly equivalent in size to Asian elephants, rather than to strongly dwarfed elephants.
