Massive mammoth skeleton sells at French auction
A 10,000-year-old woolly mammoth skeleton has sold for more than €500,000 euros at auction in the French city of Lyon. The skeleton is reportedly the largest of its kind to be privately owned.
Auction in a train station
A massive woolly mammoth skeleton sold for €548,250 ($644,234) in an auction in Lyon, France. The sale, which was put on by the Aguttes auction house, took place inside the Lyon-Brotteaux train station where they installed the massive fossil.
Recreating a giant
Using levers, pulleys and ladders, a man carefully positions the mammoth's skull. Towering over onlookers, the skeleton is 3.4 meters (11.2 feet) tall and 5.3 meters (17.4 feet) long. Experts estimate that the animal weighed about 1,400 kilograms (3,086 pounds).
Arranging the bones
A man checks to make sure every preserved rib is correctly in place. The skeleton was found 10 years ago in Siberia. Its previous owner was a hunter who preserved the animal's remains in his home.
Nearly intact specimen
Wrapped in protective foam and packaging tape, the mammoth's massive tusks await their final reveal. The skeleton retained 80 percent of its original bones, which the auction house said were in "fine condition."
Unraveling the tusks
Besides its long, shaggy hair, the woolly mammoth was known for its enormous, curved tusks. Once out of their wrappings, the well-preserved tusks gleamed with patches of caramel and ivory.
Off to a new owner
Businessman Pierre-Etienne Binschedler won the bidding war for the prehistoric creature. Binschedler, CEO of a French waterproofing company whose mascot is also a mammoth, said the skeleton will feel right at home in his company's lobby in Strasbourg.