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Three hundred years of scientific argument has been settled – elephants have five toes on a foot.

Although they looks as if they have an extra toe it is really a piece of bone which has grown to help their feet bear their great weight.

In 1710 Mr Patrick Blair - a Scottish doctor - published the first detailed anatomical description of an elephant, which had died near Dundee.

Blair noted that the elephant had six toes, sparking three centuries of discussion around the strange toe-like structure occasionally noted in elephant’s fore and hind feet.

But researchers at the Royal Veterinary College say the extra “toe” called a predigit on an elephant’s foot is an extended version of small-rounded tendon anchoring bones found in many mammals.

Professor John Hutchinson, who publishes the research in the journal Science, said: “Elephant ancestors seem to have evolved the enlarged predigits, upright feet, and fat pads about 40 million years ago as they became more terrestrial and larger.

“Other large land mammals have lost them and correspondingly never developed a large fatty foot pad or other features unique to elephant feet. However, strange groups of mammals such as pandas and moles have evolved similar structures for other functions such as grasping bamboo or digging. ing or suddenly manifesting complex novel features for new functions.

“Elephant ‘sixth toes’ are not as complicated or flexible as true fingers, but are good enough for what elephants use them for, and that’s all that matters in evolution.”