mastodon
/ˈmastədɒn
/noun
A large extinct elephant-like mammal of the Miocene to Pleistocene epochs, having teeth of a relatively primitive form and number.
- Mammutidae and other families, order Proboscidea: many species.
- Geologists say it probably once belonged to a woolly mammoth or a mastodon.
- In lower latitudes, mastodons and elephants, giant deer and ox, beavers, dogs and cats, and other familiar species existed in the forests and grasslands.
Derivatives
mastodontic
/ adjective ...- Then the really terrifying thought struck me: are acts of such atrocity the only way to get rid of mastodontic eyesores like these?
Origin
Early 19th century: modern Latin, from Greek mastos 'breast' + odous, odont- 'tooth' (with reference to nipple-shaped tubercles on the crowns of its molar teeth).