Million dollar dinosaur: Jurassic giant goes under the hammer

An almost-perfect dinosaur skeleton has sold at a French auction house for more than €1 million to an unnamed buyer.

The 7-meter long, 2-meter high (23ft-6.5ft) allosaurus skeleton acquired a winning bid of €1.1 million (US$1.2 million) at the Aguttes auction house in Lyon, France Saturday night.

Hailing from the late Jurassic period, the allosaurus was a brutish carnivore what preyed on large herbivorous dinosaurs by ambushing them. The species went extinct some 135 million years ago.

This particular allosaurus, named Kan, was discovered in 2013 in the Jurassic Era Morrison Formation in the western United States  – the most abundant source of dinosaur fossils in North America.

Its skeleton is 75 percent complete and shows the deadly predator in a running position with its mouth wide open.

The auction house described the beast as “the archetype of the great predators of the Jurassic era.”

The buyer of the ancient fossil wants to remain anonymous but has confirmed Kan will remain in France and will go on public display.

He made the purchase by telephone and told the Aguttes auction house he "wants to keep the location a surprise".

The Jurassic giant didn’t quite meet the €1.3 million ($1.8 million) price tag, however, secured for another allosaurus skeleton at Sotheby’s auction in Paris in 2010.