The only extant lichen flora of Antarctica, that of C.W.Dodge, published in 1973, includes 415 species, 44.6% of which were described by Dodge as new to science. We have recently examined the types of 152 (of a total of 186) species described by Dodge and accept only 31 species (20%) as valid. All of Dodge's species were described as endemic to Antarctica; after revision Antarctica has lost 121 endemic lichens. On the other hand, recent lichenological research in Antarctica has added many lichen species to its lichen flora. This paper summarizes the results of the last 20 years of lichenological exploration of Antarctica, and considers the main floristic-phytogeographic elements in the flora. The known lichen flora of Antarctica is reduced from 415 to 260 species, the percentage of endemic species falls from 91% to 38%, and that of bipolar and cosmopolitan species increases from 2.4% to 41.5%. Although these figures are likely to change in the near future as a consequence of the present intensive lichenological research in Antarctica, they suggest that the lichen flora of the continent, and especially of continental Antarctica, is a young one, which mainly originated by long-distance dispersal in the Quaternary period. Antarctica, biodiversity, flora, lichens, phytogeography