76 Million-Year-Old Dinosaur Skeleton Sells For $6M At NYC Auction

NEW YORK CITY — The fossilized skeleton of a dinosaur that roamed Earth more than 76 million years ago was sold in New York City this week for just over $6 million, according to a BBC report.

The Gorgosaurus skeleton — a distant relative of the tyrannosaurus rex — was sold to an anonymous buyer at Sotheby's natural history auction Thursday, BBC reported. The skeleton was expected to attract bids of up to $8 million.

The Gorgosaurus — whose name means "fierce lizard — was an apex carnivore that lived in what is now the western United States and Canada during the late Cretaceous Period. It predated its relative the Tyrannosaurus rex by 10 million years.

The skeleton sold Thursday was discovered in 2018 in the Judith River Formation near Havre, Montana, Sotheby's said. It measures nearly 10 feet tall and 22 feet long.

All of the other known Gorgosaurus skeletons are in museum collections, making the one sold this week the only specimen available for private ownership, the auction house said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.