Most complete dodo specimen

The dodo (Raphus cucullatus) – an extinct flightless bird of the pigeon family from Mauritius – is thought to have died out in the late 17th century. The most intact example today is the virtually complete (approximately 98%) skeleton displayed at the Mauritius Institute in Port Louis, Mauritius, which comprises almost all its original bones (minus a few toe segments). The key factor that distinguishes this dodo skeleton is that it represents a single bird, where as other examples are composites pieced together from the bones of several birds. This specimen was discovered in the early 1900s by the French amateur naturalist Louis Etienne Thirioux (1846–1917) in the mountainous region of Le Pouce on the outskirts of Port Louis in northern Mauritius. If considering intactness beyond just bones, then arguably the best-preserved example is the Oxford Dodo (aka Tradescant Dodo), housed at the Oxford University Museum of Natural History, UK. It comprises a skull (uniquely still with skin attached), a sclerotic ring bone, a femur, a foot, a feather (removed from the head) and several tissue samples.

Thirioux also recovered a second very well-preserved dodo skeleton from Le Pouce at around the same time (now housed at the Durban Natural Science Museum in South Africa), however analysis suggests this specimen is a partial composite – albeit of perhaps as few as two birds.

Both the origins of the Oxford Dodo and how it came to be in its current state are the subject of speculation. What is known is that this specimen was bequeathed in the late 1600s by Sir Elias Ashmole with the founding of Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum. It is widely believed that Ashmole acquired the dodo from the Tradescant collection, a cabinet of curiosities curated by naturalists/collectors John Tradescant and his son (also John) in the early 17th century housed in the Musæum Tradescantianum (opened: late 1620s) in South Lambeth, London. The earliest mention of the exhibit at the museum is a catalogue dating to 1656, where it is listed as “Dodar, from the Island Mauritius; it is not able to flie being so big”; it is recorded under a “Whole Birds” section, implying that the dodo was fully intact at this point in time.

One theory goes that the Tradescants acquired the specimen in London, based on the report of a live dodo exhibited in the city in the late 1630s by politician Sir Hamon L’Estrange: “About 1638, as I walked London streets, I saw the picture of a strange fowle hong out upon a cloth … and myselfe with one or two more then in company went in to see it. It was kept in a chamber, and was a great fowle somewhat bigger than the largest Turky Cock, and so legged and footed, but stouter and thicker and of a more erect shape, coloured before like the breast of a yong cock fesan, and on the back of dunn or deare coulour. The keeper called it a Dodo…”

Regarding the dodo’s transformation from a complete specimen to its present selection of body parts is also shrouded in mystery, including one legend (now debunked) that the bird was thrown onto a bonfire in 1755 and the head and foot were at the last minute salvaged by the Ashmolean’s curator! However, the most likely explanation is that less sophisticated taxidermy methods of the era resulted in natural deterioration and disintegration of the bird over the centuries, owing to factors such as insect pests and decay.