The bone was discovered around 150 years ago (Image: Swindon Borough Council)
Part of one the largest ever fossil found in the UK is set to return to the town it was found in.
The bone came from a discovered around 150 years ago in Swindon.
Swindon Borough Council councillor Marina Strinkovsky told : “It’s fantastic that a piece of it is coming home.”
It was originally found in a quarry pit at Swindon Brick and Tile Company in 1874.
Now, it will be displayed at the Museum & Art Swindon.
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This comes after earlier this year, the UK’s largest ever footprint was found.
It was discovered in a quarry in Oxfordshire where over 200 footprints were found dating back 166 million years.
Four of them were made by sauropods, plant-eating dinosaurs that walked on four legs.
Another track is thought to have been created by a .
Most of the complete stegosaurus skeleton is on display at the Natural History Museum in London, but locals are happy to see part of it return to Swindon.
This illustration shows what the dinosaur would have looked like (Image: Getty Images)
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“Swindon was really important in the history of palaeontology and loads of important fossil hunters lived here or visited Swindon in the late 19th Century to look for specimens,” Ms Strinkovsky continued.
Stegosaurs were which lived 150 million years ago, they had a herbivorous diet and were predominantly found in North America.
Palaeontologist Dr Neville Hollingworth and Sally Hollingworth, who have been working alongside museum volunteers and staff through the Arts Council England-funded ‘Unlocking Collections’ project.
The pair said: “We saw this specimen for sale and realised its importance straight away.
“We’re delighted that Museum & Art Swindon has put this truly unique find from the town on display and, hopefully, this will help raise awareness about the town’s .”
This month, unearthed the world’s smallest known sauropod dinosaur footprints.
Estimated to date back to the Jurassic Period, approximately 170 million years ago, these diminutive tracks were found in a village near Chamdo city and announced by the research team.
Associate Professor Xing Lida from the China University of Geosciences said such small sauropod footprints are very rare.