![]() ![]() Link said personally he would like to see a Swiss museum buy the skeleton, adding "it would be nice to have it here permanently." Knocking on different parts of the bone, he also demonstrated the different sounds made by original bone and the plastic additions used to fill out the skeleton. ![]() We don't want that," he said, referring to the aborted Christie's auction. There are some stories about fakes out there. "You have to see where it has been repaired. It was important for the fixes to remain visible, he said, showing the dark lines where the fissures had been. With a parakeet named Ethel perched on his shoulder, Walen filled in cracks using what looked like dental tools and modeling compound. "We didn't break anything yet," he said proudly, as he and his colleagues worked on two large ischium bones, which sat near the dinosaur's pelvic area. The Koller auction house has estimated that the skeleton will go for between six to eight million Swiss francs ($6.5-8.7 million).Īart Walen, a Dutch expert with 30 years' experience assembling dinosaur skeletons, agreed. "Fossils are not, or at least should not be, considered trophies or glorified action figures," Holtz said.īut Link stressed that 95 percent of known T-Rexes are currently in museums, and said any private collector who might buy Trinity was likely to make it available to scientists and lend it out to museums. He also took issue with auctions of significant dinosaur skeletons and other fossils, which have raked in tens of millions of dollars in recent years.Įxperts have warned such trade could be harmful to science by putting the specimens in private hands and out of the reach of researchers. Vertebrate paleontologist Holtz, of the University of Maryland, remained skeptical, insisting that Trinity "really isn't a 'specimen' so much as it is an art installation." We are not hiding in any way that this specimen comes from three different dig sites," he said. Link insisted Koller was being transparent about the origins of the bones. ![]() The skeleton is being sold by a private individual. Just over half of the bone material in the skeleton comes from the three Tyrannosaurus specimens-above the 50 percent level needed for experts to consider such a skeleton as high quality. The 3.9-meter (12.8-foot) high skeleton went on display on a red carpet under crystal chandeliers in a concert hall in the city Wednesday. Trinity, which is being sold by an anonymous "private individual", is expected to fetch six to eight million Swiss francs ($6.5-8.7 million) when it goes under the hammer in Zurich on April 18, the Koller auction house estimates.īut Christian Link of Koller said he believed the guide price was a "pretty low" estimate. "Sue" went under the hammer in 1997 for $8.4 million, and "Stan", which took the world-record hammer price of $31.8 million at Christie's, in 2020. The two sites are known for the discoveries of two other significant T-Rex skeletons that have gone to auction. Trinity, the Swiss T-Rex, is made up of bones from three dinosaurs excavated between 20 from the Hell Creek and Lance Creek formations in Montana and Wyoming. The Swiss sale comes only four months after Christie's withdrew another T-Rex skeleton days before it was to go under the hammer in Hong Kong after doubts were reported about parts of it. to combine multiple real bones from different individuals to create a single skeleton." The huge skeleton will go under the hammer in a rare auction in Switzerland next month after being sent to Zurich from the United States in nine giant crates.īut paleontologist Thomas Holtz-who is against the sale of such specimens-told AFP that it was "misleading" and "inappropriate. ![]()
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