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Aepyornis

                        AEPYORNIS (Gr., "tall bird"), genus of several fossil birds from Madagascar,
                        especially the elephant bird. This bird may have survived until the first humans
                        arrived on the island and thus gave rise to the legend of the roc, the gigantic
                        mythical bird once believed to have inhabited India and later popularized in the
                        Arabian Nights.

                        The adult elephant bird was about 2.4 to 2.7 m (about 8 to 9 ft) tall and massive,
                        weighing perhaps as much as 450 kg (about 1000 lb), by far the heaviest of any
                        known bird. Its eggs have been found fossilized in the mud of swamps.