Object of the week- Collection of skulls: 20170911-111234.jpg

03 Jan 2018

Object of the week- Collection of skulls

Museums and galleries

Showcasing some of the animal kingdom’s biggest and best biters, this fearsome display is simply jaw-some.

The display, entitled Bite Me! includes teeth, skulls and bones from modern mammals and reptiles as well as the fossilised remains of extinct creatures.

Exhibits include the tooth of a megalodon, a gigantic, 60ft long shark which lived around three million years ago, as well as the skulls of an 11,000 year-old brown bear, a dolphin and an Atlantic walrus complete with long, canine tusks.

Also part of the Bite Me! display are the fossilised skull of an ichthyosaur, a dolphin-like marine reptile which lived 210 million years ago, the tooth of a plesiosaur, a large, Jurassic ocean predator and the lower front tooth of a woolly mammoth.

They are shown alongside the skulls and teeth of more modern animals like a hyena, a wild boar and a crocodile.

Councillor Brian Selby, Leeds City Council’s lead member for museums and galleries, said: “These remains give a great insight into a key aspect in the evolution of some of our planet’s most impressive creatures over hundreds of millions of years.

“I’m sure the eye-catching way they have been displayed will also grab the attention of visitors and fill their imaginations with images of fearsome giant sharks and huge wooly mammoths.”

Bite Me! can be found in the Life on Earth Gallery and Leeds City Museum is free to enter.

For more information, please visit: http://www.leeds.gov.uk/museumsandgalleries/Pages/Leeds-City-Museum.aspx

ENDS


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