Two rare dinosaur fossils discovered over forty years ago on an Irish island are now on public display in Cork, offering a rare glimpse into Ireland’s prehistoric past. The fossils, unearthed on the beaches of Islandmagee, County Antrim, date back roughly 200 million years to the Jurassic period.
Dr Mike Simms, curator of geology at the National Museums Northern Ireland, described the find as “extraordinary,” noting that Ireland’s geology makes such discoveries extremely rare. “We have the wrong kind of rocks,” he explained. “Most rocks that would contain dinosaurs of this age were either eroded away or deposited out at sea.”
The fossils were collected by Roger Byrne in 1980 and 1981, who carefully identified bones disguised as rounded black pebbles. One fossil is part of the lower leg of a carnivorous dinosaur similar to Sarcosaurus, while the other belongs to the upper leg of Scelidosaurus, a four-legged herbivore. Both specimens have been temporarily loaned to the Glucksman Gallery at University College Cork for a six-month exhibition, though they are normally housed at the Ulster Museum.
The exhibition, titled “Domain of the Dinosaurs,” features not only these rare finds but also skeletal casts of Megalosaurus, Iguanodon, and marine reptiles like Ichthyosaurus and Plesiosaurus. Taoiseach Micheál Martin, who opened the display, praised it as a collaboration of science and the arts, capturing the imagination of visitors.
Ireland has occasionally yielded other prehistoric treasures, such as the 200,000-year-old woolly mammoth fossil discovered in Canada, which gives researchers a broader understanding of Pleistocene-era animals. Similarly, these Irish fossils provide scientists and the public with a unique window into Jurassic life, an era rarely represented in the region.
For history enthusiasts and dinosaur lovers, this exhibition offers an unprecedented opportunity to see dinosaur fossils up close, understand Ireland’s unlikely prehistoric environment, and explore how these ancient creatures once roamed areas that now seem geologically unsuitable for such finds.
