Erik Stensio

Erik Helge Osvald Stensio, born Andersson, was a Swedish paleozoologist born October 2, 1891, in Stensjo by, Kalmar County, Sweden, who died January 11, 1984, in Stockholm, and who served as professor and keeper of the Department of Palaeozoology at the Swedish Museum of Natural History in Stockholm from 1923 to 1959. He founded the so called Stockholm School of vertebrate palaeontology, specializing in vertebrate anatomy and evolution, with research on placoderms and early vertebrates that shaped later understanding of the group, and he named numerous prehistoric vertebrate genera while training students including Erik Jarvik and Tor Orvig who continued his school. He was elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1927, a Foreign Member of the Royal Society in 1946, received the Daniel Giraud Elliot Medal in 1926, the Wollaston Medal in 1953, the Linnean Medal in 1957, and the Darwin-Wallace Medal in 1958.