The Press and Journal (Inverness, Highlands, and Islands)
Mammoth sale put on ice
Bidders fail to raise required funds for prehistoric family skeletons
A complete family of prehistoric mammoth skeletons has failed to sell at auction.
The collection of four Ice Age forms went under the hammer for the first time in West Sussex yesterday.
The highly-anticipated lot included a one-yearold infant, only the second known complete baby mammoth skeleton in the world. They were expected to fetch between £250,000 and £400,000 but the highest bid reached was £240,000.
Summers Place Auctions in Billingshurst said it had received a lot of interest from museums hoping to be the first in the world to show a family scene of the ancient, extinct species.
The auction house is keen for the skeletons to remain as a four and is continuing to invite offers from interested parties.
The infant, which is 61 inches tall and 111 inches in length, is joined by a slightly bigger young female, aged around eight or nine.
Her skeleton is 76 inches tall 127 inches long.
They are accompanied by an adult male and female.
The male is 94 inches tall and 157 inches in length.
The adult female, is 78
“They were found close together so we are assuming they are a family”
inches tall and 129 in length.
It is unknown exactly how the family died but their remnants were found together during building works near Tomsk, Siberia, in 2002.
Their relatively small frames indicate they lived in poor conditions and most probably died at the end of the Pleistocene period, around 12,000 to 16,000 years ago. inches
Errol Fuller, curator at Summers Place, described the mammoths as the most exciting lot in the auction.
He said: “They are really remarkable. They were found close together so we are assuming they are an actual family unit. We know they died very quickly, we don’t know why but we think because of some natural disaster.”
A spokeswoman for the auction house said: “The auction house had hoped this rare opportunity and the low estimate would have encouraged museums around the world to bid for this ice age family.
“Sadly, although there had been interest, none of the museums had managed to get the required funding in time and felt they were unable to bid. Summers Place Auctions is hoping to be able to arrange a sale with the intention to preserve their integrity as a family in the near future.”