Bos primigenius
Masovia, Poland · last recorded 1627, Jaktorów
Three accounts · c. 52 BCE–1549
“These are a little below the elephant in size, and of the appearance, color, and shape of a bull.”
Caesar, Gallic War 6.28; English, 1872, p. 154
Caesar reports this at second hand, in a digression whose authenticity has been questioned.
| Place | Hercynian forest, Germania · approximate |
|---|---|
| Subject | Size, hunting in pits, drinking horns |
| Language | Latin · English translation |
“the bison, which has a mane, and the urus, possessed of remarkable strength and swiftness.”
Pliny, Natural History 8.15 (38); trans. Bostock and Riley, 1855, pp. 262–263
| Place | Germania · named region |
|---|---|
| Subject | Distinguishing urus from bison |
| Language | Latin · English translation |
“Masovia, which borders on Lithuania, is the only province which has in it the kind of buffalo which in the language of the country is called thur” […]
Herberstein, 1549; trans. R. H. Major, 1852, II, p. 96
Major translates the Latin bubalus as “buffalo.”
| Place | Masovia, Poland |
|---|---|
| Subject | Royal preserves, crossbreeding, hide girdles |
| Language | Latin · English translation |
Julius Caesar, c. 52–51 BCE; Pliny the Elder, 77 CE; Sigismund von Herberstein, 1549.
Caesar’s description of the uri of the Hercynian forest, their size, their capture in pits, and the use of their horns as cups.
Pliny distinguishes the maned bison from the urus among the wild oxen of Germany.
Herberstein distinguishes the bison from the urox or thur, kept in a few preserves in Masovia, and records a calf given to him by Sigismund Augustus.