Mammoth Ivory

Mammoths once ranged across Europe, Siberia and much of North America; most populations died out after the last ice age, about 10,000 to 40,000 years ago, with remnants surviving on Wrangel Island until about 3,600 years ago. Because their range included Siberia and Alaska, tusks found in permafrost can be well preserved, while tusks buried in soil often show blue to brown staining. The CITES ivory guide cites estimates that over 7,000 tons of mammoth ivory have been placed in trade in the last 350 years and that over 550,000 tons of tusks remain buried in Siberia.

Like elephant ivory, mammoth ivory shows Schreger lines (cross-hatched, chevron-like patterns) on cross-sections, so look for a surface where the carving exposes one. In the CITES guide's reference set, the average of at least five outer Schreger angles was below 100° for every mammoth and above 100° for every modern elephant; a CITES working document cautions that both can show angles between 90° and 115°, so the test is not always definitive. A long-wave UV (365 nm) check helps screen out substitutes: ivory, teeth and bone fluoresce brightly, while most plastics and resins look dark or dull purple. Blue to brown burial staining can also point to mammoth rather than elephant. CITES documents also report elephant ivory mislabelled as mammoth, including a carving stained to look like mammoth ivory, so the label alone is not proof.

A 2018 CITES notification states that mammoth ivory has been traded since ancient times and has been a known commodity from Russia since the 18th century, and that demand grew greatly after the moratorium on elephant ivory trade began in the 1980s. At that time mammoth ivory trade was not illegal in any country except India and mammoths were not listed in the CITES Appendices (the 2020 CITES ivory guide also lists Mammuthus as non-CITES listed); because this allows illegal elephant ivory to be "laundered" as mammoth, Israel and Kenya consulted Parties on a possible Appendix II listing. Rules can change, so check current national and CITES requirements before buying or shipping.

The Japanese retailer Pascle associates mammoth ivory with strength and vitality and says it is regarded in China as an amulet believed to ward off evil and bring wealth and good fortune. These are retailer-attributed beliefs, not verified effects.