Illustration from An Historical Relation of the Island Ceylon (1681), by Robert Knox
Describing themselves as an elephant lover and a passionate supporter of animal rights, they write to thank me for displaying "compassion with innocent, gentle and highly intelligent creatures forced to suffer needless cruelty at the hands of man".
Now, whilst it's true that I do sympathise with wild things in captivity and dislike all forms of cruelty to animals, I think it should also be mentioned that elephants - which are undeniably intelligent - are not always so gentle. And I'd never describe them as innocent; certainly not in the way in which I suspect my correspondent is using the term.
For not only are wild elephants - particularly the young males - prone to violent and aggressive behaviour (in India, they regularly enter villages at night, damaging property and causing human fatalities), but beasts co-opted into human society have long been complicit in warfare and capital punishment.
Execution by elephant, for example, was once common throughout SE Asia; the supposedly gentle giants happily crushing, dismembering, or impaling prisoners with weaponised tusks. The animals were not only smart and versatile enough to be trained in the sophisticated art of torture, but seemed to derive pleasure from the opportunity to exercise power, inflict pain and test out their deadly skills on unfortunate victims.
The point is this: you can throw someone to the wolves or to the lions if you simply want them to be torn to pieces; but if you really want to extend their suffering and have them murdered by an animal rather than merely killed, then you're going to have enlist the help of an elephant.
Note: the spectacle of elephants executing captives both horrified and fascinated European travellers and there are numerous written accounts. The practice was eventually suppressed by the colonial powers that controlled the region in the 18th and 19th centuries.
