British Institute of Persian Studies

Nicholas LowickAuthor(s): Alexander MortonSource: Iran, Vol. 25 (1987), pp. v-viPublished by: British Institute of Persian StudiesStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4299779 .

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OBITUARY

NICHOLAS LOWICK

For some months it had been known that Nicholas Lowick was seriously ill, but until September last he had bravely continued to work. He attended the Tenth International Congress of Numismatics which was held in London then and was actively arranging to complete and publish his long-planned Corpus of Early Abbasid Coinage. The suddenness of his death, which occurred on 11 November 1986, made the loss of a kind person and fine scholar at the early age of 45 particularly sad.

Nicholas Manning Lowick went to school at Clifton College and from there proceeded to Christ's College, Cambridge, where he took his degree in French and German. On coming down from the University he was selected by the British Museum to fill the post of Assistant Keeper with respon- sibility for Oriental Coins. So, in 1962, he joined the Museum's Department of Coins and Medals, in which he was to work for the rest of his life. Initially, Islamic numismatics, the field in which Nicholas specialized, was also represented in the Museum by the distinguished figure ofJohn Walker, by whom he may be said to have been trained. However, Walker too died long before retirement age, in 1964. Subsequently Nicholas was in charge, for most of the time single-handed, of the Oriental collections. In 1979 he achieved the unusual distinction of being awarded a Personal Deputy Keepership in the Department on the strength of his academic record. His time at the Museum fell in a period when much Oriental material, from the Middle East in particular, was appearing on the international numismatic market and the active and discriminating policy of acquisition he pursued has resulted in considerable expansion and enrichment of the Museum's holdings.

In a characteristically self-effacing but efficient manner he involved himself in the affairs of the learned societies closest to his work. He was Library Secretary of the Royal Numismatic Society, and a Member of the Society's Council between 1964-1981. From 1973-1986 he was Reviews Editor of that

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vi JOURNAL OF PERSIAN STUDIES

Society's journal, the Numismatic Chronicle; from 1975-1986 he was also a section editor of, and a major contributor to, the Society's other serial publication, Coin Hoards. He was a Member of the Council of the Royal Asiatic Society and served it as Honorary Secretary from 1977-1986. He was a member of the British Institute of Persian Studies and directly concerned in its work through his participation in the excavations at Siraf. For three seasons, between 1968 and 1973 he was at the dig as a finds assistant, working particularly on the coins of course, but also taking responsibility for the inscriptions on tombs and buildings. His reports on these, including the detailed catalogues of both groups of material was

published in 1985 in the Institute's Siraf series. SirafXV. The Coins and Monumental Inscriptions is in fact one of the earliest fascicules to appear. Involvement in the excavation, with its great interest for international trade and, afortiori, currency, had already helped inspire other work on the numismatic evidence for exchanges in the Persian Gulf, notably an article in Studies in Honor of George C. Miles (Beirut, 1973), "Trade patterns in the Persian Gulf in the light of recent coin evidence".

His list of publications come to more than fifty items, without including certain things such as the numerous reviews he wrote for the Numismatic Chronicle. Many of the articles are substantial. The focus is very much on Islamic coinage up to the sixteenth century, though there are a number of studies of epigraphic topics in the same area. It is of course a vast and complicated field, and he had mastered it thoroughly, knowing not only the coins but a great deal of historical and other literature. Much of the emphasis was, as numismatics demands, on detail. There are descriptions of hoards, for instance, of very different composition, from Isfahan and Ra's al-Khaima, Gampola and Agrigento. But if the physical descriptions were meticulous the need to consider the context, to go further than the individual coins, was well understood in these, as in other, studies. His awareness of and ability to deal with the variety of topics that coins can raise may perhaps be exemplified by a few selected examples: mint organization ("A Samanid/Kakwayhid mule"); imitation ("A new type of solidus mancus"); historical circumstances ("The joint coinage of Humayun and Tahmasp at Qandahar"); iconography ("The religious, the royal and the popular in the figural coinage of theJazira"). In addition, since the 1960s he had been collecting material for a major work, the Corpus of Early Abbasid Coinage already mentioned. It was intended to continue the series of the British Museum's Islamic Catalogues begun with Walker's Umayyad volumes, and like them, was to include much more than the Museum's own collection. Work was well advanced: he had hopes of finishing it within a year. The Lowick family and the Department of Coins and Medals are now making plans for its completion.

Its eventual publication will be welcome, although we shall continue to regret the other work he might have done. However, it is the person that those who knew him will miss more. He was very reserved but far from humourless and he had interests and friends outside the scholarly and numis- matic worlds. He had his own convictions too and could be gently and politely obstinate where they were concerned. Occasionally one glimpsed a certain dissatisfaction with the increasing bureaucracy and security-consciousness of the Museum-but he did not regard such things as ones to be much aired with outsiders. Chiefly, however, one remembers his helpfulness. In the world of Islamic numismatics, one realizes now, he occupied a remarkable place, which it is difficult to imagine being filled: he acted as a kind of sure central point in a far-ranging system of largely informal contacts. He seemed to know everyone, collectors, dealers, scholars, from all over the world. Certainly he knew many of them well, and he was willing patiently and thoroughly to answer all their questions, as well as those of the general public. If one wanted to identify a coin, to get a reference, an address or an introduction, to complete a

shaky bibliography or simply discuss an idea, one used to know that Nicholas was there to listen and provide information and guidance.

ALEXANDER MORTON

Please Note A number of Nicholas's colleagues and other friends are arranging to establish a fund in his memory, to be devoted

to the promotion of Oriental Numismatic Research. The fund will be supervised by the Royal Numismatic Society and will initially be organized by the Secretary and Treasurer of the Society, Mr. J. E. Cribb and Mr. N. G. Rhodes. Those wishing to contribute or enquire further are requested to write to them at the Royal Numismatic Society, c/o Department of Coins and Medals, British Museum, London WC1.

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