Allactaga elater (Lichtenstein, 1828) . Abh. König. Akad. Wiss., Berlin, 1825:155 [1828].

TYPE LOCALITY: W Kazakhskaya, Kirgiz Steppe. The type locality given by Lichtenstein (1828) is in W Kazakhstan, according to Vinogradov (1937), Kuznetsov (1944, 1965), and Ognev (1963b), not E Kazakhstan as reported by Ellerman and Morrison-Scott (1951:529) and Corbet (1978c: 154) .

DISTRIBUTION: W Pakistan (Roberts, 1977); Afghanistan (Hassinger, 1973); Iran (Lay, 1967); NE Turkey; in former USSR (see Kuznetsov, 1965; Sludskii, 1977; and Shenbrot, 1991d), Armenia, Azerbaydzhan, Georgia, N Caucasus, north along W Caspian Sea to Lower Volga south to Turkmenistan, east through Kazakhstan to NE Xinjiang, Nei Mongol, and N Gansu, China (Ma et al., 1987), in desert and semi-desert zones.

SYNONYMS: aralychensis, bactriana, caucasicus, dzungariae, heptneri, indica, kizljaricus, strandi, turkmeni, zaisanicus (see Corbet, 1978c, 1984; Shenbrot, 1991d).

COMMENTS: Subgenus Allactaga . Does not include vinogradovi (see comment therein). Detailed review provided by Ognev (1963b). Karyotype contributed by Vorontsov et al. (1969c). Subspecific revision and additional distributional data provided by Shenbrot (1991d).