Obituaries (from BBBS 2004)

We announce with regret the deaths of the following Byzantinists, members and friends: George Every, Jakov Ljubarskij, Michael Maclagan, Donald Nicol, Paul Speck, and Peter Topping.

George Every (1909-2003)

As a poet (and friend of T.S.Eliot and Charles Williams), his last book was A Christmas Collection: Poems of Incarnation and History (2001). As a historian (and, pupil of Christopher Dawson), he was author of The Byzantine Patriarchate 451-1204 (1947, 1962, 1980).
George Every taught at the Anglican College at Kelham from 1929-1973 (where he was a lay brother SSM), and at the Roman Catholic College at Oscott thereafter (where he was Librarian). His twin brother Edward Every was Canon of Jerusalem.
George Every was Honorary Research Fellow of the Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies of the University of Birmingham, and a founder member of the SPBS. He never missed a Spring Symposium.

(A.Bryer)

Jakov Ljubarskij (1929-2003)

Professor Ljubarskij, who was professor of Byzantine studies at the University of St. Petersburg for thirty years (1973-2003), was one of the leading specialists on Byzantine literature, especially historiography. He received the Ph.D. from the Moscow Pedagogical College in 1964 with a dissertation on the Alexiad of Anna Komnene as a historical source, and received his habilitation from Leningrad University in 1978 with a dissertation on "Michael Psellos as a Man and Writer". Among his books were annotated Russian translations of the works of Theophanes Continuatus, Michael Psellos and Anna Komnene, as well as an analytical volume on the personality and writings of Michael Psellos. Professor Ljubarskij was a fellow three times at Dumbarton Oaks, in 1989, 1990-1991 and in the spring term of 1997.

(Alice-Mary Talbot)

Michael Maclagan (1914-2003)

Michael Maclagan (1914-2003) died on 13 August, in Oxford, where he taught Byzantium, largely in Trinity College, from 1937-1981 (with the usual interesting break in Cairo during the war). Obituaries have been published in The Independent (2 September) and elsewhere.
Although as a classicist turned medievalist don, he never called himself a Byzantinist, Michael Maclagan represented Byzantium in Oxford during lean years after the war. The Oxford University Byzantine Society met in his rooms and he helped organise the 13th International Byzantine Congress in Oxford in 1966 - and designed its badge inscribed: OXFORD = BOSPOROS.
He published the sensible and durable The City of Constantinople in the Thames and Hudson Ancient People and Places series in 1968. His research interests were in Byzantine heraldry, not a contradiction in terms, for Michael Maclagan was also a Herald, starting with various Pursuivancies from 1948. An imposing figure in full tabard, he towered over an apprehensive Harold Wilson at the investiture of the Prince of Wales.
Michael Maclagan was a founder member of the SPBS and its steadfast supporter until his death. He was a kind, careful and modest man who gave us style with scholarship.
(A.Bryer)

Peter Topping (1916-2003)

From 1976-1984 Prof. Topping was Senior Research Associate at Dumbarton Oaks and Advisor for the Byzantine Library and Publications; after his retirement in 1984 he continued as an Honorary Senior Research Associate. He also served on the Committee of Senior Fellows for Byzantine Studies from 1980-1986. He is remembered at Dumbarton Oaks as an enthusiastic bibliophile, and as a gracious and learned colleague.
After receiving his Ph.D. at the University of Wisconsin, Prof. Topping taught at Northwestern University, the University of California at Santa Barbara, and the University of Cincinnati, where he was Charles Phelps Taft Professor from 1967-1978. He was also Librarian at the Gennadeion Library in Athens from 1953-1960. Peter Topping was a distinguished scholar of Latin Greece from the period of the Fourth Crusade into the 18th c. His books include Feudal Institutions as Revealed in the Assizes of Romania (Philadelphia, 1949); with J. Longnon, Documents sur le régime des terres dans la principauté de Morée aux XIVe siècle (Paris, 1969); and Studies on Latin Greece, A.D. 1205-1715 (Aldershot, 1977).
(Alice-Mary Talbot)

Obituaries from BBBS 2010:
Dr Benedikt Benedikz (1932-2009)
Konstantinos Ikonomopoulos (1980-2009)
Profess Ihor Sevcenko (1922-2009)

Obituaries from BBBS 2009:
John Barron (1934-2008)
Julian Chrysostomides (1927-2008)
Zaga Gavrilović (1926-2009)
Michael Hendy (1942-2008)
Angeliki Laiou (1941-2008)
Geoffrey Lewis (1920- 2008)
Evelyn Patlagean

Obituaries from BBBS 2008:
Kenneth Storer (1924-2007)

Obituaries from BBBS 2007:
Gregorio de Andrés
Professor J.M. Hussey, 1907-2006
Geoffrey Constantine Lintott, 1926-2006
A.H.S. Megaw, 1910-2006
Professor Anna Różycka-Bryzek, 1928-2005

Obituaries from BBBS 2006:
Professor Dr. Natela Aladashvili (1923-2006)
Professor Philip Grierson (Dublin 1910-Cambridge 2006)
Jean Irigoin

Obituaries from BBBS 2005:
Sir Steven Runciman (1903-2000)

Obituaries from BBBS 2003:
Lennart Rydén

Obituaries from BBBS 2002:
Professor Sir Dimitri Obolensky

Obituaries from BBBS 2001:
The Hon Sir Steven (James Cochran Stevenson) Runciman, C.H
Nikaolaos Oikonomides
Herbert Hunger