Pleasant surprise! Family's sacred totem turns out to be dinosaur eggs

In India's Madhya Pradesh, a family who once believed an object to be sacred recently came to know that it was a dinosaur egg! This fascinating discovery took the Mandaloi family by surprise.

The Mandaloi family, residents of Padlya village, have been worshipping large white spherical stones for years, referring to them as "Kakar Bhairav" or the lord of the land. Vesta Mandaloi, a member of the family, had been worshiping what he believed to be remnants of his forefathers, serving as protective totems for their farmland and cattle.


Similar practices were observed in other families within the Dhar district, where villagers unknowingly placed their faith in what they thought were deities or ancestral relics but were, in fact, dinosaur eggs.


During a routine field visit, experts from the Sahni Institute of Palaeosciences encountered these "stone ball totems." Upon analysis, it was revealed that these stone balls were fossilized eggs of the Titanosaur species of dinosaurs.

The Titanosaurs, the first dinosaur properly named and described in the Indian subcontinent, earned their name, meaning 'titan lizard,' due to their silvery greyish color. Originating around 70 million years ago during the Cretaceous period, Titanosaurs are recognized as the largest dinosaurs to have roamed the planet.


In 2023, over 250 eggs of these colossal lizards were discovered in MP's Dhar district, where they once roamed the Narmada Valley. A significant study conducted by researchers from the University of Delhi and the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) in Bhopal identified 92 nesting sites containing 256 fossilized eggs of Titanosaurs. Published in January of the same year in the scientific journal PLOS, the study marked a crucial step in uncovering essential evidence of the existence of these prehistoric creatures.