[muawiyah]

Elephants (so-called Indian elephants) aren't as big as you imagine, but large Belgian warhorses in the Middle Ages were!

I figure the operational size for both animals was pretty much the same ~ because anything beyond human scale would put them beyond "control".

It's only in modern industrial times that we've gotten into using machinery that dwarfs us, and that's only because we build in OFF SWITCHES. Elephants and horses have an off switch but it's buried under feet of flesh and gone. You need a spear to reach it! Last thing you want is an animal you can't turn off ~ like a bull African elephant rampaging in must.

[allmendream]

There are many theories as to what type and size destriers attained, but they apparently were not enormous draft types.[5] Recent research undertaken at the Museum of London, using literary, pictorial and archeological sources, suggests war horses (including destriers) averaged 14–15 hands, and were distinguished from a riding horse by their strength, musculature and training, rather than their size.[6] This estimate is supported by an analysis of medieval horse armour located in the Royal Armouries, which indicates the equipment was originally worn by horses of 15 to 16 hands,[7] about the size and build of a modern field hunter or ordinary riding horse.[8]

From Wiki....but the sources look legit.

15 - 16 hands = 60-64 inches tall = 5-6 feet tall at the withers or top of the shoulder.

Elephant = Asian male elephant around 11 feet tall. African elephant 10 to 13 feet at the shoulder.

Nobody has ever seen any evidence (armor or skeleton) of a horse as large as an elephant.