Professor Đặng Vũ Khiêu. — VNA/VNS Photo

HÀ NỘI — Professor Đặng Vũ Khiêu, noted for influential in-depth research works on Vietnamese culture, passed away Friday noon in Hà Nội at the age of 105.

He died of old age, despite the best and most attentive care from doctors and the family, according to his son Professor Đặng Cảnh Khanh.

He was born on September 16, 1916, in Hành Thiện village, Xuân Hồng District, the northern province of Nam Định.

He graduated baccalauréat (tú tài) in Hải Phòng, moved to Hà Nội to teach and first got engaged in Communist revolution efforts during the French colonial time before 1945.

He has managed through many culture-related positions at Party and State bodies, including director of culture department of Zone 10 in Việt Minh’s base Việt Bắc during the first Indo-China war, deputy director of Vietnam News Agency, and the first director of the Việt Nam Academy of Social Sciences.

He is a respectable scholar of Việt Nam, who has received the Government’s Hồ Chí Minh Prize in the first award round ever in 1996 for the series ‘Bàn về văn hiến Việt Nam’ (Discussions on Vietnamese culture and civilization), conferred the title of ‘Hero of Labour in Đổi mới (Renewal) period’ in 2000 and First-class Independence Medal in 2006.

He was honoured as one of the 11 outstanding citizens of capital city Hà Nội in 2010, when the city celebrated its millennial anniversary.

He was the author of many epitaphs for fallen heroes and martyrs at the monuments and temples dedicated to them throughout the country, as well as various books on aesthetics, Marxist morality, the Communist Party of Việt Nam's stances on morality, and the 'glorious' role of arts in Việt Nam. — VNS