CosmoCaixa Science Museum unveils latest edition to exhibition: 50,000-year-old Siberian mammoth

Barcelona's CosmoCaixa Science Museum unveiled the latest addition to its exhibition: a large six-meter-long and 3.5-meter-tall Siberian mammoth. The mammoth is between 40,000 and 50,000 years old and will now be part of the permanent exposition.

The animal is originally from the Russian city of Tyumen, north of Kazakhstan, and dates back to the Ice Age.

Javier Hidalgom, head of Fundació La Caixa's expositions, praised the state of conservation of the animal.

Meanwhile, Valentí Farràs, the museum director, said that the skeleton will now become one of the stars at CosmoCaixa. Managers will open a contest to name the animal in the upcoming weeks.

He said that it will be an essential addition to Barcelona's exhibitions as "Who does not want to come and see it?"

The mammoth exhibited at the museum is a complete mammoth that has been rebuilt after uniting pieces of three different adult mammoths. The first part was found in 2017, after torrential rain in Tyumen, in the permafrost, a thick subsurface layer of soil that has been below freezing point for several years.

A US company was in charge of importing, restoring and setting the animal before it was sold to CosmoCaixa. The museum took advantage of the Covid-19 pandemic to buy the specimen, as many sites were shut down and the market was halted.

After its first exhibition at Seville's CaixaForum museum in 2021, followed by Zaragoza, Madrid, Palma, and later Tarragona, the mammoth will now be permanently installed at Barcelona's CosmoCaixa.

Other fossils will be found alongside the Siberian animal, such as a Holmesina, an armadillo-like species, or a steppe polecat.