elephantine

[ el-uh-fan-teen, -tahyn, -tin, el-uh-fuhn-teen, -tahyn ]

adjective

1. pertaining to or resembling an elephant.
2. huge, ponderous, or clumsy:

   elephantine movements; elephantine humor.

elephantine

/ ˌɛlɪˈfæntaɪn /

adjective

1. denoting, relating to, or characteristic of an elephant or elephants
2. huge, clumsy, or ponderous

Word History and Origins

Origin of elephantine¹

1620–30; < Latin elephantinus < Greek elephántinos. See elephant, -ine ¹

Example Sentences

Ten years after, she has yet to finish her second book, which has bloomed into an elephantine “four-hundred-year history of mulatto people in fictional form” — what her husband Lenny calls a “mulatto ‘War and Peace.’”

From Los Angeles Times

The elephantine grand piano can easily bully its smaller partners or timidly overcompensate.

From New York Times

“He is mostly evasive. His pauses are elephantine. Broadway musicals could be mounted during his pauses.”

From Washington Post

By the 1960s, Mr. Lorayne was best known for holding audiences rapt with feats of memory that bordered on the elephantine.

From New York Times

It feels less oppressive, less elephantine, lighter and more graceful on its feet.

From Los Angeles Times