Huge egg sells for $101,813 at London auction

A huge elephant bird egg was sold for $101,613 (£66,675) at a Christie’s Auction in London Wednesday.

The partially fossilized egg of Aepyornis maximus is 12-inches long and has a 8¾-inch diameter. It reportedly came from Madagascar and is labeled as pre-17th century, when the bird became extinct.

According to Christie's, the elephant bird was believed to be a giant flying beast known as the Roc (or Ruhk) in the tales of Sinbad and accounts of Marco Polo's voyages. The bird allegedly grew to around 10 or 11 feet in height.

The egg was sold during Christie's bi-annual Travel, Science & Natural History auction which "contains a broad spectrum of items from the written accounts of voyages made by early travellers and the navigational and scientific instruments they used to the paintings, prints, maps, atlases and globes that resulted from those expeditions into newly discovered lands beyond Europe," according to Christie's website.