South African linguist and authority on the genus Lithops. He studied African languages at the University of Witwatersrand after the Second World War, having served nearly six years in Africa and the Western Desert, and from 1948 until 1982, was a lecturer, then Professor and Head of Department at the university. The Unisa Library now holds his extensive book collection, which covers a wide range of subjects from history to botany and contains valuable items on African languages, including some rare grammars and dictionaries. Since 1947 he has researched Lithops, Stapeliads and other succulents in South Africa, Namibia, and Botswana, and has described and published many new taxa, especially Lithops, but also Trichocaulon felinum. He married Naureen Lambert in 1967, with whom he later co-authored Lithops, Flowering Stones (2005). His wife participated in all aspects of the research on the genus with a special interest in the seed and capsule structure and in 1980 D.T. Cole named Lithops naureeniae D.T.Cole in honour of his wife. Lithops coleorum Hammer & Uijs is named after both husband and wife.