Rare Stegosaurus skeleton to be sold at auction in NYC
NEW YORK - How would you like to own a dinosaur?
Now's your chance - if you have a couple of million dollars handy.
A 150 million-year-old fossil is the most complete and best preserved Stegosaurus specimen of its size ever discovered, and the first of its kind to go up for auction, Sotheby's said.
Experts believe the fossil, known as "Apex," will sell between $4-6 million. The skeleton will be on display at Sotheby's until it goes up for auction on July 17.
Apex was discovered in May, 2022 in Colorado, and its excavation was complete by Oct. 2023. Sotheby's said it is the first time an auction house has worked since the day of the dinosaur fossil's discovery to bring it to market, so every step of its excavation, restoration and mounting have been documented.
Apex is far from the first dinosaur skeleton to come up for auction. The first-ever dinosaur sold at auction happened in 1997, when a a Tyrannosaurus rex fossil sold for $8.36 million. Since then, the market for such things seems to have grown. In 2020, another T. rex skeleton fetched $31.8 million. In 2022, a Gorgosaurus skeleton sold at auction for $6.1 million, as did a T. rex skull, also selling for $6.1 million.
