The finest stegosaurus to appear at auction, “Apex” has made history selling for $44.6 million at Sotheby’s to become the most valuable fossil ever sold at auction.
Exceeding its pre-sale low estimate by over 11 times and selling to applause after 15 minutes, “Apex” was chased by seven bidders during Sotheby’s live auction in New York, eventually selling to an anonymous buyer, who intends to explore loaning the specimen to a U.S. institution. Following the sale, the buyer remarked: "Apex was born in America and is going to stay in America!"
Drawing visitors in the thousands this weekend, “Apex” was the star lot of Sotheby’s Natural History Auction, sold alongside Fossils, Meteorites, Minerals, Gogottes, and – for the first time – Paleolithic Tools. The sale achieved a total of $45.8 million (pre-sale estimate $4.9 - $7.4 million), the highest ever total for a Natural History auction. “Apex” follows a long tradition of unique and important dinosaurs offered at Sotheby’s, its price today surpassed “Sue”, the first-ever dinosaur to be sold at auction, who achieved $8.4M in 1997 and “Stan” who achieved $31.8M in 2020 at Christie’s.
Hailing from Dinosaur, Colorado, and measuring 11 feet tall and 27 feet long from nose to tail, "Apex" was discovered by commercial paleontologist Jason Cooper at his property in 2022. Sotheby's specialist Cassandra Hatton collaborated closely with Cooper from the day of discovery to document the entire process, from excavation to restoration, preparation, and mounting, ensuring that the specimen is handled with the highest standards and transparency, preserving important contextual information, such as fossilized skin impressions, and three ossicles (throat armor), which were sold together with “Apex” today. This is the first time an auction house has been involved with a specimen of this kind throughout the whole process.
"Apex" was discovered on privately owned land in Moffat County, Colorado, fittingly near the town of Dinosaur, aptly named for its proximity to the Dinosaur National Monument. This region is the richest source of dinosaur fossils in the United States due to its location in the Morrison Formation, a sequence of Upper Jurassic sedimentary rock centered in the states of Colorado and Wyoming. Found alone, with no other fossils nearby, "Apex" represents fossils from one Stegosaurus.
“Apex” represents an important palaeontological discovery as it ranks high among the most complete skeletons ever found. Virtually complete, with 254 fossil bone elements (of an approximate total of 319), the skeleton belonged to a large, robust adult individual, and evidence of arthritis, indicating that it lived to an advanced age. The specimen shows no signs of combat related injuries, or evidence of post-mortem scavenging, and exhibits a number of interesting pathologies. Overall, the bones are preserved in exquisite detail, exhibiting little distortion, and retaining much of their original shape and surface characteristics. The fossilization is superb, with even small, delicate bones being preserved in fine detail including seldom preserved skin impressions, fragile cervical dermal plates, and throat armor. The bone is thoroughly mineralized, dense, and heavy, with its surface coloration being dark grey to black, colors consistent with fossils originating from the Morrison Formation in Colorado.
The skeleton was preserved in hard sandstone, which protected the bones from being distorted, resulting in an informative specimen with a high degree of integrity and distinction.
Main Image: Photo Credit: Matthew Sherman
Anna Melnykova, "Palace of Labor (palats praci), architector I. Pretro, 1916", shot with analog Canon camera, 35 mm Fuji film in March 2022.
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