summary
- A nearly complete stegosaurus skeleton sold at auction on Wednesday for a record-breaking $44.6 million.
- Sotheby’s, which handled the auction, said the fossil was the best-preserved specimen of a stegosaurus of its size ever found.
- The identity of the buyer was not initially made public, but The Wall Street Journal reported that it was hedge fund billionaire Kenneth Griffin.
A nearly complete 150-million-year-old stegosaurus skeleton sold at auction on Wednesday for a record-breaking $44.6 million.
Sotheby’s, which handled the New York auction, described the fossil as the “most complete” and “best-preserved” stegosaurus specimen of its size ever found. The massive skeleton, measuring 11 feet tall and 20 feet long, has been nicknamed “Apex.”
Dinosaur fossils It’s estimated to be worth $6 million.But the price far exceeded expectations, setting a new world record for a fossil at auction after a bidding war that lasted more than 15 minutes, according to Sotheby’s representative Anna Tisci.
Sotheby’s did not disclose the identity of the buyer. WThe Street Journal later reported: It was Kenneth Griffin, the billionaire CEO of the hedge fund Citadel.
According to Sotheby’s, Apex’s skeleton was excavated in 2022 by commercial paleontologist Jason Cooper on his private property near the town of Dinosaur in Moffat County, Colorado. The bones were discovered in the Morrison Formation of sedimentary rock, which is centered in Colorado and Wyoming and extends to parts of 11 other states.
The auction house said the fossil was found with no other specimens nearby and no signs of injury, adding that signs of arthritis suggested the stegosaurus may have lived to an advanced age.
“Apex marks an enormous milestone as one of the finest fossils of its kind ever unearthed,” said Cassandra Hutton, Sotheby’s global head of science and popular culture. It said in a statement “Stegosaurus is one of the most widely known dinosaurs, and its unmistakable silhouette has fascinated and amazed people for generations,” the release said in a statement ahead of the sale.
Stegosaurus is a four-legged, armored dinosaur best known for the distinctive line of kite-shaped plates on its back.
The pointy-tailed dinosaurs lived during the Late Jurassic Period, between about 155 million and 145 million years ago.
Another nearly complete stegosaurus fossil, known as Sophie, is housed at the Natural History Museum in London, but Apex’s skeleton is more than 30 percent larger, according to Sotheby’s.
The previous record for the most expensive fossil sold at auction was set in 2020 when a Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton named “Stan” sold for $31.8 million.
The first dinosaur sold at auction was the now famous “Sue the T-Rex“The Great Gatsby” was auctioned in 1997 and purchased by the Field Museum in Chicago, where the painting is on display, for $8.4 million.
