Anomodonts - Paleozoic dental experimenters

Location: Main building / Floor 2 / Second floor hall

For the first time, parts of skeletons and complete skeletons of anomodonts are exhibited in the Darwin Museum. They are ancient reptiles that inhabited the Earth more than 260 million years ago. Until the advent of dinosaurs they were the most common herbivores on the planet. This exhibition is a rare chance to see the original remains of extinct creatures and their complete reconstructions outside the Kirov region (Together with the Vyatka Paleontological Museum).

The Permian period (299 - 252 million years ago) is one of the landmarks in the development of life on Earth. It is marked by great mass extinction and disappearance of 95% of the species that existed at that time. This period was an important time for the evolution of terrestrial vertebrates. Warm-bloodedness, wool, sweat glands, vibrissa whiskers, improved dentition... Thanks to these and other innovations the animals of the Permian fauna were the crown of evolution for millions of years and have settled throughout the land, which was one huge supercontinent Pangea. Alas, most of them did not survive the Perm catastrophe, but those who managed to survive gave rise to dinosaurs, birds and mammals.

It is surprising that "progressive lizards" 260 million years ago lived on the territory of nowadays Russia, in the Kirov region. It was here, on the banks of the Vyatka River near the city of Kotelnich, where unique faunal complex was discovered – over 20 species of animals of the Permian period, 16 of them are new, previously unknown to science species and amazingly preserved. As one of the largest pareiasaur sites in the world, Kotelnich became famous throughout Russia and far beyond its borders. Annual exploration and excavations at the Kotelnich site are carried out by the Vyatka Paleontological Museum, established in 1994 to study this natural monument and popularize paleontology.

The famous "cheeky lizards" came to Moscow from Vyatka in 2022, and over 150,000 visitors of the Darwin Museum had the opportunity to get to know them. This year Muscovites and guests of the capital will meet with "strange-toothed" reptiles - anomodonts, which were trampling the planet more than 250 million years ago. You will find out why did these animals need fangs and whether they wore mustaches; how did they chew food without teeth and whether they could walk in the swamps; whether they were warm-blooded and whether they possessed the rudiments of intelligence.

Also at the exhibition you can see reconstruction of the head of giant elephantosaurus (“elephant lizard”), as well as the fantastic appearance of therapsoid – hypothetical intelligent creature that could have appeared if anomodonts had not died out and survived to this day.

The exhibition is held with the support of the Government of the Kirov region.