The database was founded in 1995 as EMBL Reptile Database when the founder, Peter Uetz, was a graduate student at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany.
Databasen blev startet i 1995 som EMBL Reptile Database da grundlæggeren, Peter Uetz, var student ved European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) i Heidelberg, Tyskland.