Tyrannosaurus rex Gus sold by Sotheby’s for $50 million
A Tyrannosaurus rex skeleton named Gus has been sold for $50.1 million (about £44 million) at a Sotheby’s in New York on Tuesday.
The purchase sets a new world auction record for the most expensive dinosaur fossil, after an anonymous bidder outbid six others in a 10-minute sale.
The sale breaks Sotheby’s previous record, held by Apex, a Stegosaurus dinosaur skeleton that sold for $44.6 million in 2024.
The skeleton dates back 67 million years to the Late Cretaceous period.
Sotheby’s described the dinosaur as one of the largest and most complete fossils discovered, measuring at 38 feet (11.6 meters) long and approximately 61 per cent complete.
In 2021, the fossil was discovered on a cattle ranch in South Dakota and was named after its owner, the late Gary Gus Licking.
Ahead of the auction, Cassandra Hatton, Sotheby’s vice chairman and global head of science and natural history, said the fossil is one of “the biggest and most complete T. rex ever found” due to its completeness and state of preservation.
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