On the fossil rhinoceros Elasmotherium (including the collections of the Russian Academy of Science)

Abstract

This article summarizes the result of nearly 200 years of study of the fossil rhinoceros Elasmotherium? first described by Gotthelf Fischer in 1808. Problems of its geographical and chronological distribution are discussed, and morphological and ecological reconstructions of the species by various researchers are demonstrated and discussed. The article also gives information about the original type material of G.Fischer, which originally was preserved in the Natural History Museum of the Imperial Moscow University, and is presently stored in the Vernadsky State Geological Museum of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Especially the extensive work of assistant professor of V.A.Teryaev of the Moscow Institute of Geological Exploration on Elasmotherium are highlighted.