Nanotyrannus skeleton 'Jodi' sells for $47.3m at Sotheby's, dwarfing its $9m estimate

Six bidders — competing online and over the phone — spent twelve minutes last Tuesday driving the price of a Nanotyrannus skeleton from a $6–9 million estimate to $47.3 million at Sotheby's in New York. The specimen, named 'Jodi', is now the second most expensive dinosaur fossil ever sold at auction, behind only 'Gus', a T. rex skeleton that fetched $50.1 million earlier this year.

The buyer has not been publicly identified — a detail that has sharpened the anxiety of paleontologists who fear the skeleton could vanish into a private collection, permanently beyond the reach of researchers and the public.

Jodi was discovered in 2019 by rancher Jodi Pierson on her privately owned land in the Hell Creek Formation in Garfield County, Montana, near the town of Jordan. The skeleton measures 19.6 feet long and stands roughly 9.6 feet tall on its armature, comprising approximately 191 fossil bone elements, including a virtually complete skull. Missing bones were replaced with custom 3D-printed and sculpted elements. According to Sotheby's, bone size and development indicate the individual was an adult.

Jodi is one of only three substantial Nanotyrannus skeletons known to science. The second, known as Jane, is housed at the Burpee Museum of Natural History in Rockford, Illinois. The third is part of the 'Dueling Dinosaurs' fossil at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences in Raleigh — two skeletons apparently locked in combat, a Triceratops and a smaller tyrannosaur now identified as a Nanotyrannus, excavated in 2006 by Clayton Phipps, the same commercial paleontologist known as the 'Dinosaur Cowboy' who excavated Jodi, from a site not far from where Jodi was found.

The sale also arrives at a pivotal moment for the species itself. Whether Nanotyrannus is a distinct dinosaur or simply a juvenile T. rex has been debated for decades; researchers only recently tipped the scientific consensus toward recognizing it as a separate genus, making Jodi the first substantial specimen to come to market since that confirmation, according to Sotheby's.

A fast, highly specialized carnivorous tyrannosaurid that lived alongside Tyrannosaurus rex at the end of the Cretaceous, about 67 million years ago... previously hypothesized by some to be adolescent T rex, Nanotyrannus has been shown to have over 150 morphological differences that distinguish it from its much larger cousin.— Sotheby's, auction house statement

The fossil was sold with 'full rights', meaning it contains no copyrighted elements from other dinosaurs, and its new owner can create and sell replicas to museums or collectors, according to CNN.

For scientists, the price tag is less a cause for celebration than a warning sign. The core concern is not the money itself but what a private sale means for access — to study the bones, take samples, run scans, and apply analytical methods that may not even exist yet.

We've really just found out that Nanotyrannus is real, and now one of the best skeletons is about to be sold to the highest bidder. It's harrowing to think it could disappear into the vaults of a collector rather than displayed in a museum where it can wow and inspire kids and families and the public at large.— Steve Brusatte, professor of paleontology and evolution, University of Edinburgh

At the same time this sale went on, some museums are closing (the Academy of Natural Sciences at Drexel in Philadelphia) or being threatened with closure (the Sternberg Museum of Natural History at Fort Hays State University) because of cost overruns literally only 1/10th that of the final cost of Jodi. So a person really interested in paleontology could do vastly more good by supporting the ongoing operations of multiple museums than the sale of one specimen.— Thomas R Holtz Jr, principal lecturer on vertebrate paleontology, University of Maryland

Now maybe the as-yet unidentified purchaser will donate it to a museum or similar institution, where the public can see it and where scientists now and in future generations can measure the bones, take samples and scans of the fossils, and apply current analytical procedures... But if it simply graces the lobby or ballroom of one of some billionaire's mansions, unseen and unaccessible to all but their friends, servants and so forth, it is effectively lost to both the public and the scientific community. In fact, at that point, it is no different than if it had just been left in the ground.— Thomas R Holtz Jr, principal lecturer on vertebrate paleontology, University of Maryland

I'd be very surprised if the specimen ended up in a public collection and available for study, and so until that point it is effectively outside of science.— David Hone, paleontologist and reader in zoology, Queen Mary University of London

These amazing fossils should stay in the public sphere for scientists to study, for children to be awed and inspired, and for everyone to be able to marvel at worlds long past and what we can learn from them.— Linda Ivany, professor of evolutionary paleoecology, Syracuse University

Hone also noted that the price itself raised eyebrows beyond the ethical debate. 'It does feel like this is a bubble of prices on dinosaurs which must burst at some point, they can't keep rising forever,' he said, according to CNN.

Sotheby's vice-chair Cassandra Hatton framed the sale in scientific terms, crediting the excavation team's 'passion and expertise' and calling the result 'a testament to the fact that we can all make major contributions to science.' Whether the unidentified buyer shares that view — and whether Jodi ends up accessible to researchers — remains the open question.

Why it matters — With the buyer unidentified and scientists warning that private ownership could lock away one of only three known Nanotyrannus skeletons from research and public view, the sale forces a reckoning over who controls access to irreplaceable natural history.

Reported by theguardian.com, cnn.com, usanews.net