Digging the elephant skeleton weighing over 500 kg in Nghe An

Mr. Pham Van Dong (in hamlet 4 of Hong Son commune, Do Luong district, Nghe An) accidentally stumbled upon a giant elephant skeleton weighing about 500 kg, dating to thousands of years at the bottom of Khe Dinh river.

The skeleton is currently preserved at Anh Dong's house (Photo: Nhandan)

Mr. Dong said, around 13:00 on December 14, 2006, while he was visiting the field, he happened to see under the Khe Dinh River a piece of limestone rising vertically, about 20cm in diameter. Strangely, he dug deep into the ground more than 5m; Under the layers of mud that gradually revealed huge pieces of bone. Seeing bones, he continued to mobilize more friends and relatives to dig up for nearly 3 days (from 14-17-12-2006), assembled into a skeleton. Weighing about 500kg almost completely, in the process of fossilization.

Some people and agencies determined that this is the bone of a giant elephant. The skeleton is dated thousands of years, because some bones such as vertebrae, shoulder bone, pre-bone . have fossilized signs. All of these elephant bones are still being stored at Mr. Dong's house. After the elephant skeleton was discovered, hundreds of curious people from Anh Son, Tan Ky and Thanh Chuong districts . came to see.

Even the merchants were present immediately to fall in price to buy all the bones.

Mr. Dong said: 'Recently, the Department of Culture and Information of Nghe An province sent a delegation on inspection and evaluation but has not yet made an official conclusion on the date of this skeleton.

Dong's wish and his family is moving this giant elephant skeleton into the archaeological museum for archaeologists to study. However, if the authorities continue to " not comment ", he can sell to merchants. According to some " wholesalers ", this may be the skeleton of the mammoth elephant, which has become extinct. This is thousands of years. This type of bone is very valuable in preparing medicines. Therefore, more than 500kg of elephant bones cost up to hundreds of millions of VND.