Placing the special issue within the historiography of human–elephant relationships, the introduction addresses the challenges associated with the integration of elephants into academic narratives. It pays special attention to the epistemological and disciplinary opportunities presenting themselves when building such more-than-human narratives. The integration of elephants, in and of themselves, into the academic narrative is reliant on ethological, biological, ecological, and zooarchaeological research, which itself is a historical and situated scientific endeavour. Anthropological and historiographic methods developed in this special issue deepen our understanding of human-elephant relationships. By critically addressing research narratives concerning elephants, this introduction contributes to an epistemological rereading of scientific narratives on elephant and wildlife management to strengthen multidisciplinary dialogue and promote co-existence.