The mammoth, with its shaggy coat, enormous tusks, and ponderous presence, is one of the great icons of extinction. It is also one of the few prehistoric creatures that is known not only from a few scattered fossilized bones, but from I specimens that have been preserved perfectly, with skin, flesh and hair.

Complete mammoths lie frozen in the icy wastes of Siberia, and from time to time one is exposed as the temperature or conditions change. So, while there is doubt about when most prehistoric animals first appeared on earth, we know precisely when and where the mammoth lived.

Not only are there excellent specimens, we also have pictures of mammoths painted by people who actually saw them alive - our ancestors who, thousands of years ago, decorated the walls of caves with the animal's image. Today, this artistic tradition continues and many modern painters have chosen to create pictures showing the mammoth as it appeared in life. Its lumbering form is often shown crossing great ice fields or snowbound plateaus.

This book tells the story of the mammoth, how it lived and died and how its memory lives on in the present day.

Errol Fuller is the author of The Great Auk, The Extinction of the Original Penguin, and The Dodo, Extinction in Paradise.