Derby Museum and Art Gallery – Hippo in Derby

I’ve never really given thought about whether hippos used to roam about Derby, but I’m not sure that I would have guessed that this was their hunting ground once. Workmen discovered these bones in Allerton in March 1895, now a suburb of Derby, when they were digging a new well at the Crown Inn. Private investors funded something of a dig and when this was completed the skeleton was given to the museum, where it remains proudly on display. 127 bones were discovered in the dig, although some of these were from another hippo and some from a passing elephant, and the hippo was thought to be around three metres in length.

The discovery proved important as it showed that there must have been a land bridge at some point between Britain and mainland Europe as it was unlikely that a hippo would have swum several miles since they can’t actually swim at all. It was later reported that when the pub had been constructed in 1878 that other bones had been discovered, but the builders threw them away not realising what they’d found. To be fair, they probably weren’t really expecting to discover the ancient remains of a river beast, perhaps more hoping to find a lost coin or two. It’s not thought that there were any humans in Britain at this time, around 120,000 years ago, so they wouldn’t have had any little territorial disputes. The hippo that was found is the same species of the hippo that live in sub-Saharan Africa today. I left the museum rather pleased that I know the answer in case anyone asks me if there used to be hippos in Derby.