Bodylevsky Vitaly Ivanovich

(26.04.1898-09.08.1968)

The famous paleontologist is a stratigraph, one of the most subtle and accurate Soviet stratigraphs, the largest in the USSR and the world connoisseur of the Mesozoic Arctic, professor of the Department of Historical Geology of the Leningrad Mining Institute. His teachers were academicians A.A. Borisyak, D.V. Nalivkin, Professor Yu.A. Pearls

Born in the village of New Ropsk, Bryansk Region, in the family of a rural teacher. In 1915 he graduated from the Novozybkovskoe real school and entered the Leningrad Mining Institute, which he graduated from in 1924 in the geological exploration department. Already his student works of Bodylevsky attracted attention by the detail of the study and the logical conclusions. Even before graduation, he was invited by Professor A.A. Borisyak to the department of historical geology for scientific work, which lasted throughout his life and was combined with active teaching. For various specialties, Bodilevsky taught courses in paleofaunistics, stratigraphy, historical geology, and geology of the USSR, since 1932 he led a special course “Methods of stratigraphic research” developed by him for the first time in the USSR, later renamed “Methods of stratigraphic correlation”.

The main direction of scientific research is the paleontological and stratigraphic study of the Jurassic and Cretaceous sediments, mainly of Siberia and the Arctic. His geochronological scheme of the Jurassic Arctic received universal recognition. Compiled a monographic description of the Upper Jurassic and Lower Cretaceous Boreal Fauna. He developed a scheme for a detailed stratigraphic division of the Jurassic and Cretaceous systems in Siberia, singled out biostratigraphic zones. His scheme was adopted by the Interdepartmental Stratigraphic Committee of the USSR. The study of the fauna of the Ust-Yenisei depression served as the basis for a fundamental revision of the Mesozoic stratigraphy of this petroleum region. The detailed dismemberment of the most complete in the Arctic region of the Eisfiord section on the island of Western Spitsbergen, compiled by Bodylevsky, became a reference point for the study of all Mesozoic exposures in the Arctic.

The merits of Bodylevsky were awarded the Order "Badge of Honor" and the medals "For the Defense of Leningrad", "For Labor Valor", "For Valiant Labor in the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945".

He died in Leningrad, buried in the Northern cemetery.

Mountain height of 448 m on the eastern side of the Wörning Glacier, Nordenskiöld Land, the island of West Spitsbergen. The coordinates are 78° 02.4'N  14° 02.0'E.