Mammoth

A mammoth is a species of the extinct genus Mammuthus. These proboscideans (elephants or their extinct relatives) were often equipped with long curved tusks and, in northern species, a covering of long hair. They lived from the Pliocene epoch from 4.8 million years ago to around 4,500 years ago.The word mammoth comes from the Russian мамонт mamont, probably in turn from the Vogul (Mansi) language.They are believed to have originally evolved in North Africa about 4.8 million years ago,also found in South Africa and Kenya, is also believed to be one of the oldest species (about 4 million years ago).
New DNA research links ancient mammoth to Asian elephant !A group of international scientists, including Dr Ian Barnes of Royal Holloway, University of London, have constructed the first ever complete ancient DNA sequence of a 11,000 year old woolly mammoth, and have discovered that it was more closely related to the Asian elephant than to the African elephant, as previously thought.
Most mammoths died out at the end of the last Ice Age. A definitive explanation for their mass extinction is yet to be agreed upon. A small population survived on St. Paul Island, Alaska, up until 6000 BC,and the small mammoths of Wrangel Island became extinct only around 2500 BC.