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This happened in 2005 and is absolutely amazing:

The Sultan’s Elephant is a show created by the Royal de Luxe theatre company in the French city of Nantes, involving a huge moving mechanical elephant and other associated public art installations. In French it is called La visite du sultan des Indes sur son éléphant à voyager dans le temps (literally, “Visit From The Sultan Of The Indies On His Time-Traveling Elephant”).

The elephant is made mostly of wood, and is operated by over ten puppeteers using a mixture of hydraulics and motors. It weighs 42 tons, as much as 7 African elephants.

The parade also features this “little” girl:

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The show went also to London and Antwerp.

More photos | The Sultan’s Elephant (WikiPedia) | Royal De Luxe website | Via