• Jonathan the tortoise is thought to have been born in 1832.
• He lives on St. Helena, a tiny volcanic British territory
• More than a thousand miles off the coast of Africa.

The tortoise, named Jonathan, has spent the last 140 years on a desert island. He’s been in the news a lot lately because he just got a big title: he’s the oldest living land animal in the world.

This year, Jonathan will be 190 years old. Well, that’s the best guess we can make about how old the 440-pound chelonioid is.

“To be honest, I suspect he’s older, but we can never know,” said Joe Hollins, the vet who takes care of Jonathan on St. Helena island, a tiny volcanic British territory more than a thousand miles off the coast of Africa.

Most of Jonathan’s life has been spent ambling (although slowly) with three other land tortoises around the grounds of the governor’s mansion on St. Helena, Plantation House.

Jonathan is thought to have been born in 1832, according to a letter that says he came to St. Helena “fully grown” from the Seychelles Islands in the Indian Ocean in 1882, said the man who wrote the letter. Hollins said that “fully grown” meant that a turtle was at least 50 years old.

Hollins says that between 1882 and 1886, a picture was taken of Jonathan grazing at Plantation House. He had been given as a gift to the governor of St. Helena.

“It was quite traditional for [tortoises] to be used as diplomatic gifts around the world, if they weren’t eaten first,”  he said, adding that ship crews liked them because they could be stacked and didn’t need food or water for days.

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