BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. - Believe it or not, a 12,000-year-old, 4 1/2-foot fossilized walrus penis was purchased at auction Sunday by Ripley Entertainment Inc., an auction official said. The company, which owns 63 Ripley's Believe It or Not museums in 11 countries, including one on Hollywood Boulevard, bought the walrus member for $9,600, including fees, said Josh Chait of I.M. Chait Auctions & Gallery.

Although it is believed to be the biggest ever found, the Walrus member sold for less than the $12,000 to $16,000 it was expected to go for.

"I'm glad the penis went to Ripley, so everybody will have an opportunity to see it. It is definitely interesting," Chait said. "It's one of the biggest penises in the world as far as I know."

It was discovered in the frozen tundra of Siberia and dates back 12,000 years to the Pleistocene Period. The mammal's manhood is mummified, with a layer of perfectly preserved skin intact, according to Chait. A 22-foot mounted skeleton of an aquatic dinosaur called a Mososaurus, from the Cretaceous period of Morocco and more than 65 million years ago, fetched the highest bid of $90,000, from a private collector, Chait said.

In all, the nearly 200 lots of natural history items garnered a total of about $500,000, he said.

The walrus penis wasn't the only piece of "prehistoric pornography" on the auction block. Bidders also vied for a pair of mating 40 million-year-old insects from the Baltic region of Russia. The two love bugs are forever trapped in the heat of the moment in amber.

Other items at the auction in Beverly Hills included a long curvy Mammoth tusk from the Pleistocene period and a 1.94 gram piece of the moon, along with other meteorites, dinosauria, archeological artifacts and gems and minerals.