Limited by authoritarian restrictions and civil war, access to Libya has been restricted and herpetological research curbed since World War II. This combined with a perceived low reptilian diversity means that very little is known about reptiles in Libya.
Originally intended to survey and collect reptiles in Libya, this study was impeded by the events of the "Arab Spring" in 2011, and as results continued as a museum-based programme. Entitled "Atlas of the Reptiles of Libya", the study gathers all available data from museums records via GBIF, scientific publications and other publically available sources.
The produced atlas contains records from 2061 occurrences of 66 reptile species in 683 localities, many of which unfortunately are too imprecise to georeference. Describing three marine turtles, three terrestrial chelonians, 39 lizards and 21 snakes, the atlas provides full taxonomic details, descriptions and images of each species with information on known distributions including maps of occurrences in Libya.