India, Nov. 3 -- The cheetah is the only large mammal India has lost since independence, and for most of its history in the subcontinent there are no bones or photographs to tell its story. What survives from the pre-modern era are cave paintings, Sanskrit lexicons, Persian chronicles and Mughal miniatures. Cheetah's story is how a cat that once ranged from Punjab to the Deccan was hunted, tamed and captured out of existence.

The cheetah is one of roughly 41 wild cat species, and the odd one out. Its claws are only semi-retractile, which gives it grip as it runs prey down rather than ambushing it. The Asian subspecies, Acinonyx jubatus venaticus, split from African populations between 32,000 and 67,000 years ago. It was first described i...