An Ultra-Rare Nanotyrannus Fossil Could Fetch US$9 Million at Auction

After the massive success of “Gus,” the most valuable dinosaur ever sold at auction, Sotheby’s is placing yet another rare fossil on the block.

The house will be putting a Nanotyrannus dinosaur fossil named “Jodi” under the hammer this month. Expected to fetch somewhere between US$6 million and US$9 million, the skeleton is one of just three such fossils known to exist, and one of the most complete versions that has been discovered, too.

A rancher named Jodi Pierson discovered the rare fossil—hence its name—back in 2019, on her privately owned land in Garfield County, Montana, within the Hell Creek Formation, an area known for holding a treasure trove of dino skeletons. She tapped her cousin, famed palaeontologist Clayton Phipps, to excavate the fossil, a process documented on the Discovery Channel series Dino Hunters. Standing at 6.5 feet tall and spanning 19.6 feet, “Jodi” has a nearly complete skull with 53 bones, along with 35 teeth. The rest of the skeleton has all four of its claws, as well as a complete pelvis, wishbone, and femur.

Nanotyrannus has quite the history. A speedy carnivore that existed some 67 million years ago at the end of the Cretaceous period, the dino lived alongside the Tyrannosaurus rex during the epoch. In fact, for 84 years, scientists have debated whether the Nanotyrannus was a teenage T. rex, or if it was a genus of its own, due to the similarities between the fossils—meaning that the T. rex wouldn’t have been the only large predator during the era. Last fall, palaeontologists Lindsay Zanno and James Napoli confirmed that Nanotyrannus was indeed its own dinosaur, marking a significant development in the field. The T. rex, as it turns out, has more than 150 differences that set it apart from its smaller cousin, including body length (40 feet compared to the Nanotyrannus’s 18 feet) and amount of teeth (12 or 13 sockets versus 17.)

“Thanks to the hard work of commercial palaeontologist Clayton Phipps, who excavated both ‘Jodi’ and the ‘Duelling Dinosaurs’, along with groundbreaking research published last fall, this debate has been settled—Nanotyrannus is indeed a valid genus,” Cassandra Hatton, Sotheby’s vice chairman, worldwide head, science and natural history, said in a press statement. “I am absolutely thrilled to bring such a significant specimen to market and look forward to sharing this dinosaur and its true identity with the world.”

And while Jodi is likely to fetch a pretty penny at auction, it likely won’t garner the same eye-watering sum as Gus did. The 67-million-year-old T. rex, one of the world’s largest and most complete fossils of the carnivore, smashed records when it sold for US$50.1 million earlier this year. Dinosaurs have long held the fascination of collectors, of course, and with that has come plenty of high price tags: Ken Griffin, for one, splashed down US$45 million to snag a stegosaurus named Apex a few years back. As for what Jodi’s final price will be, we’ll discover that soon enough at Sotheby’s live sale on October 27 in New York.

This article was originally published in Robb Report USA.

Photo: Matthew Sherman