Talk:Seeing the elephant

Roman / Carthaginian
I had always been told this was related to the Romans seeing the first Carthaginian elephants. You can talk tough when you've never seen an elephant. But once you see them will determine if you stand your ground or run. --Petercorless (talk) 03:45, 27 February 2022 (UTC)

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article does an awful job of making it clear that it's a metaphor 67.255.0.230 (talk) 22:58, 19 April 2011 (UTC)

indeed. i came in to say that i've read the article and still have no idea what the elephant represents or means or how the phrase came to be. it's a long article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.212.15.21 (talk) 20:22, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

My understanding of the term is that it referred to the overland crossing of the continent to reach California,as opposed to the Cape Horn or Central American routes to California during the Gold Rush (implying that the continent is itself "the elephant"). I got little sense of this from this odd article, although the journal quotes are interesting.156.98.253.233 (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 21:04, 2 July 2012 (UTC)

"Going to see..."
A google search seems to indicate that the phrase more commonly relating to this idiom/trope is "Going to see the elephant" - or is certainly related There are books, plays and museum references (etc.) using that. E.g.:
 * “Going to see the elephant” is an expression that is not often heard nowadays but was widely known and used in the mid and late 1800s. The phrase became popular during the late 1840s and early 1850s as it became associated with the California Gold Rush. Later in the same century, it was used in reference to the experience of soldiers in the Civil War.
 * —Historic Kansas Museum

See also:


 * Going to See the Elephant: Theater Review —Mark Bretz, Ladue News, 2 September 2012
 * "Going to see the elephant" —Television Tropes & Idioms
 * "Going to see the elephant" —Television Tropes & Idioms

~I would wp:DIY and add a section; but I am already over-committed (or should that be "need to be committed"?) ~E:74.60.29.141 (talk) 00:28, 15 December 2012 (UTC)

Yes, this is a lousy article
It fails to explain how and why the metaphor is used. Would the article be more comprehensible to a language scholar? A historian? If so, then it is an article poorly suited to a general purpose encyclopedia.--Drvanthorp (talk) 17:51, 16 February 2013 (UTC)

A whole article about an expression?
What is the logic of this page? Firstly, it is an expression, nothing more, no need for aaaalll that yap-yap. Secondly, despite all the yap-yap, it fails to convey what exactly it is "to see the elephant". Perhaps - once a proper definition is arrived at - the Wikitionary is the place for it. It contains lots of interesting information (none that helps understand what the idiom means) that could perhaps be salvaged for use in applicable pages. I would go as far as to suggest that this is a candidate for deletion. Rui &#39;&#39;Gabriel&#39;&#39; Correia (talk) 21:30, 11 April 2013 (UTC)