For hundreds of years, mammoth bones found in Europe were thought to be the bones of giants. Around 300 years ago they were identified as belonging to elephants which caused more confusion. Eventually, when it was accepted that animals that differed from those seen today had once existed, the anatomist Georges Cuvier correctly proposed that the bones belonged to an extinct form of elephant. The earliest mammoths recorded date from over four million years ago, and the larger species died out a mere 10,000 years ago. The reasons for their demise remain unclear but may have involved climate change and the arrival of human hunters.

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