rare old dinosaur has been sold at auction in the US to an undisclosed buyer for just over $6 million (£5 million).
The fossil, a Gorgosaurus – a distant relative of the infamous Tyrannosaurus rex – was discovered in 2018 and put up for sale at Sotheby’s in New York.
The buyer now gets the option to give the one-time predator a nickname.
The sale is the second ever of a fossilized dinosaur skeleton at the auction house, after the first, a T-rex nicknamed Sue, was sold to Chicago’s Field Museum in 1997.
The Gorgosaurus, the only specimen of its kind offered for private sale, was expected to attract bids of up to $8 million (£6.54 million).
The fossil was discovered in Montana in 2018 and is almost 3 meters long and 22 meters long.
The Gorgosaurus roamed the Earth about 77 million years ago. Like a T-rex, it had a large head, a mouth full of curved serrated teeth, and small two-fingered forelimbs.
Gorgosaurus – In Pictures
Though smaller than a T-rex, it was faster and had a stronger bite, according to Sotheby’s, because it “cut into thick skin and penetrated deep into the flesh of their prey.”
The specimen was the star lot in a natural history auction. Other artifacts for sale at the auction include a T-Rex tooth, a Triceratops skull, and a saber-toothed tiger skull.
The record amount raised by dinosaur fossils is $31.8 million for a T-rex sold by Christie’s in 2020, the highest price ever paid for a fossil at auction.
However, some scholars have expressed concern that the artifacts are being sold to private buyers, rather than being displayed for public knowledge and understanding.
“In my own opinion, there are only downsides,” David Polly, a professor at Indiana University Bloomington, told CNN.
“While there’s certainly no law in the US that supports this for fossils that come from private land, it’s easy for me as a scientist to argue that that fossil is important for all of us, and should really go to a public repository where it can be studied — where the general public can learn from it and enjoy it.”