VASMER, Rihard Vil’gelm (Georgij Rihardovič Fasmer, Rihard Rihardovič Fasmer, Richard Wilhelm Georg Vasmer). St.Petersburg 9/21.10.1888 — Taškent 22.2.1938.Russian Numismatist and Oriental Scholar. Born in a Lutheran merchant family of German background (still German citizens), son of Richard Julius Friedrich Vasmer (1853–1924) und Amalia Maria Julia Schaub. Educated in St.Petersburg. From 1906 studies of Arabic, Persian and Turkish at Leipzig and 1907-10 at St.Petersburg, where Bartol’d led him to numismatics. Russian citizen 1910. From 1910 worked in Ermitage cataloguing Oriental coin collections, served in WW I 1915-18. From 1920 Chief Curator and 1930 director of the department of Eastern numismatics in Ermitage. Professor’s title 1932. He was best known as a specialist of Cufic coins. Imprisoned in 1934 or 1936. He had been member of a non-communist party and kept contact with his brother, the Slavic linguist Max Vasmer (1886–1962), who was living in Germany (and wrongly accused of being a Nazi). Died of pneumonia in a camp, rehabilitated 1956. Married 1914 Alide Pavlovna Nipp.

Publications: “Die Sāsānidenmünzen der Gelehrten Estnischen Gesellschaft”, Sb. der Gel. Estn. Ges. 1927, 276-286; “Sassanian Coins in the Ermitage”, NC 5:8, 1928, 249-334.

– “O dvuh redkih zolotyh monetah delijskih sultanov”, Izv. obšč. arh., ist. … Kazan 23:4, 1927, 45-52

–  “Zur Münzkunde von Baktrien im 3. Jahrhundert n. Chr.”, Z. für Numismatik 42, 1935, 24-58.

– Wrote much on Muslim numismatics.

Sources: Wikipedia with 4 photos (long article, but in *Russian version still much more); not in Miliband and in Vasil’kov & Sorokina.