It was the subject of an expensive auction. What is it? The skeleton of a stegosaurus, christened APEX. It was sold at auction on July 17 for 44.6 million dollars in New York. This is a record amount for a fossil, announced the auction house Sotheby’s. This is the story of the dinosaur skeleton that cost millions.
“The Stegosaurus specimen named APEX was sold today (Wednesday) at Sotheby’s in New York. It was sold for a record $44.6 million. It is therefore the most valuable fossil sold at auction,” the auction house said on its social networks.
150 million year old skeleton
The skeleton is about 150 million years old. It is about 3.3 metres tall and almost 8.2 metres long from nose to tail, with a femur 1.14 metres long. This type of dinosaur is a huge herbivorous quadruped. It was distinguished by its spikes and plates distributed on its tail and back.
According to the auction house, it is one of the most complete skeletons of a stegosaurus found so far. In total, it has 254 bones recovered. The skeleton was found in 2022 on private land owned by paleontologist Jason Cooper, near the town of Dinosaur, in the state of Colorado (USA, west). The excavation lasted that year and the following year.
Record
The size and development of the bones can be used to determine some of the specimen’s characteristics. The skeleton belonged to a large, robust, adult individual. It suffered from arthritis, evidenced by the fusion of a sacral vertebra, and lived to a ripe old age, Sotheby’s said. The skeleton showed no signs of combat or evidence of having been moved by other animals.
Stegosaurus lived between 156 and 144 million years ago and most of the fossils have been found in North America. The dinosaur skeleton that cost millions is a record. The estimated price for the fossil by Sotheby’s was between 4 and 6 million dollars.
