Overview
- The mounted Tyrannosaurus rex nicknamed Gus sold for US$50.13 million in a roughly 10‑minute auction at Sotheby’s, with the winning bid placed by an anonymous telephone bidder on Tuesday, July 14.
- Sotheby’s says the specimen was excavated in Harding County, South Dakota, between 2021 and 2023 and includes 183 fossil elements, about 61% of bones by count and an especially intact skull that conserves roughly 82% of its bones.
- The buyer’s identity and the specimen’s future custody remain unresolved, and the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology and other paleontologists have publicly urged that Gus be donated or loaned to a museum so researchers can study it.
- Sotheby’s and the excavation team defend the sale as payment for years of fieldwork, preparation and documentation and say high prices can fund more digs and conservation work.
- U.S. property law permits fossils found on private land to be sold, which has helped fuel a booming market for headline fossils but also risks restricting reproducible research unless new owners commit to public or research access as some past buyers have done.