Kirill Yeskov

Kirill Yuryevich Eskov (Russian: Кири́лл Ю́рьевич Есько́в; born 16 September 1956) is a Russian writer, biologist and paleontologist. As an author he is known for The Gospel of Afranius in which he presents an atheistic interpretation of the events of the Gospel, and The Last Ringbearer in which he retells J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings from a Mordorian point of view.

Graduated from the MSU Department of Entomology from Moscow State University in 1979. In 1986 he defended a dissertation for the Candidate of Biological Sciences at the A.N.Severtsov Institute of Animal Evolutionary Morphology and Ecology of the USSR Academy of Sciences, the theme being "Spiders of Northern Siberia (horology analysis)".[1] His main scientific interests as a biologist are spiders of Siberia and Russian Far East and as a paleontologist - Paleozoic and Cenozoic eras. As of 2008[update] he is the Senior Researcher at the Laboratory of Arthropods of the Paleontological Institute of Russian Academy of Sciences and vice-president of Eurasian Arachnological Society. He works at the institute since 1988. As of 2002 he had 86 scientific publications.

Eskov discovered several new genera of spiders. Among seven ones discovered by him in 1988 is Kikimora palustris Eskov, 1988[2] It belongs to Linyphiidae family, is found in Russia and Finland, and the name translates from Latin as "marsh Kikimora". Kikimora is a female spirit in Slavic mythology and Russian equivalent of the phrase, "кикимора болотная", is well-known in the Russian common language.

He is also the author of the book "History of the Earth and its lifeforms", intended as cutting edge biology textbook for high schools.

As a fiction writer he published several books, one of the most famous being The Last Ringbearer (Russian: Последний кольценосец, Polish: Ostatni Władca Pierścienia), an alternative retelling of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, based on the proverb: 'History is told by the victors' (thus showing Mordor as the 'good guys'). Among his other books is the The Gospel of Aphranius (Russian: Евангелие от Афрания, Polish: Ewangelia według Afraniusza), a dramatic portrayal of Jesus.