Obituary: Professor Constantine Trypanis

THE NEWS of Constantine Trypanis' death must have given great sadness to many of his pupils, writes the Right Rev Kenneth Woollcombe.

I wish to add nothing to the warmth of Peter Levi's appreciation (obituary, 21 January) but simply to say that A Lexicon of Patristic Greek (edited by GHH Lampe, Oxford University Press, 1961-68) would be a far poorer guide to the meaning of Byzantine Greek words if Trypanis had not befriended some of us younger 'helpers', whom Lampe had invited to help him in the last (and, alas, hasty) stages of its preparation for the press.

Trypanis was a frequent visitor to the Upper Room of the New Bodleian Library, where we worked, and I think derived as much pleasure from introducing me to Romanos' hymns, as from explaining to me what they meant. I could not have had a better, or kinder tutor.