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Richard Pankhurst (1927-2017), was a historian and founding member of the Institute of Ethiopic Studies. Pankhurst’s mother was the suffragette and anti-fascist Sylvia Pankhurst and his grandparents were Emmeline and Richard Pankhurst. It was through his mother’s protests concerning the Italian invasion of Ethiopia that he first became interested in the country. Growing up he met many Ethiopian refugees in London. Pankhurst studied economic history at the London School of Economics and in 1956 he went to Ethiopia to teach at the University College of Addis Ababa, subsequently becoming the founder and director of the Institute of Ethiopic Studies.
In 1976, after the death of Haile Selassie and the start of the Ethiopian Civil War, Pankhurst returned to England, teaching at SOAS and LSE but, in 1978, he became the Librarian at the Royal Asiatic Society, a position he kept for several years before returning to Ethiopia in 1987 and resuming his work at the Institute. He published numerous books and articles on a wide variety of topics related to Ethiopian history.
Pankhurst led the campaign for the return of the Obelisk of Axum to Ethiopia. It was re-erected in Axum in 2008. He was given an OBE in the Diplomatic Service and Overseas section of the 2004 Queen's Birthday Honours. He was married to Rita (née Eldon) Pankhurst and had two children, Helen and Alula.