Thread: Elephant swords
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Old 12th December 2018, 01:23 PM   #89
fernando
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Default Back with Garcia de Orta ...

This is more in a way to distinguish what period chroniclers 'saw' and what they were only 'told' of, and their candid posture about such difference.

The actual Magnum Opus of this brilliant phisician was not the "ASIA" decades but Colóquio dos simples e drogas he cousas medicinais da Índia, published in Goa in 1563. Composed of 57 coloquiums where he answers questions asked by a ficticious visitor, Dr. Ruano, about his acquired knowledge of India.
In colloquy 21 - Do Ebur ou marfim e do elefante ...
Ruano: From what disease elephants die and what is their use in these lands ?
Orta:They are very melancholic and more afraid in the night than during the day and when they sleep at night it seems as they see fearful things and set themselves free, the way to prevent it is their naires (*) to sleep on top of them and keep speaking to them so that they don't fall asleep. They have several camaras (**): many times and other times strong jealousy and fall great fury in that they brake their chains and do a lot of damage through where they go by ..... As per their service besides the work of carrying and move the artillery from one place to another they serve the Kings in battle, and there are Kings who have 1 000 elephants and others less and other times they go to war armored .... here comes the part already mentioned of the tusks weapons resembling plow irons and all .... i saw them battling what i saw them doing wrong is not other thing than put people in disorder and make them flee, some times i am told they run away and cause more disruption on their own that in the opponents, this i haven't seen.
Ruano: Is there another way they fight ?
Orta: Yes, but this is one by one with their naires that teach them trained on top of them and is a very crude battle, where they wound each other with their teeth, one attacking and the other parrying they wound each other bravely and often they may be seen striking such great blows that they hurt their foreheads that one of them falls death on the ground, and there is a Portuguese worth of faith (***) who told me he saw a very powerful elephant die from a thrust that one other gave him. They also fight if they get them drunk (****) and flee, an they sometimes grab a man with their trunk an make him in pieces, as i saw a few times.

(*) As they call the elephant's master/tamer in the Malabar. In the Deccan they call them Peluane.
(**) In modern Portuguese this means chambers, but i don't figure out what it means in this context.
(***) Reliable.
(****) Jens, not drugged but ...
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