Sworders will feature a rare dodo femur bone in it’s Out of the Ordinary sale in Stansted, UK on February 13.
The dodo is the most famous example of human driven extinction.
A large, clumsy flightless bird, it evolved in a predator-free environment on the uninhabited island of Mauritius.
The dodo went extinct in the 1660s
That is until the Dutch showed up in 1598. The sailors made a huge dent in the dodo population.
The rats hitching a ride on the ships put paid to the rest by eating their eggs.
In under 70 years, the dodo was no more.
This bone was discovered in the Mare aux Songes swamp in Mauritius. It’s estimated to be around 400-500 years old and is consigned from the collection of Errol Fuller, author of the book Dodo from Extinction to Icon.
Fuller said: “In terms of importance and rarity, the dodo is one of the great icons of extinction.
“Perhaps not as important as a Tyrannosaurus Rex, but more so than anything else, little is known about it and only a few images survive – mostly 17th century Dutch paintings.”
Sworders values the piece at £2,000-3,000 ($2,852-4,278).
There’s a wealth of other intriguing pieces in the sale, but we particularly like the "Feejee" mermaid – a classic sideshow gaff made by stitching the top half of a monkey to the back half of a fish.
The Feejee Mermaid is a well-known sideshow gaff
The resulting grotesque taxidermy would be presented to paying customers as a real-life mythical creature caught in the exotic waters of the south Pacific.
This one is valued at £1,000-2,000 ($1,425-2,851).
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