five daughters. The eldest of the former succeeded his father in the parish of Eastwood, but was compelled to retire from it by an infirm state of health.
WYNTOWN, Andrew, or Andrew of Wyntown, the venerable rhyming chronicler of Scotland, lived towards the end of the fourteenth century; but the dates of his birth and death are unknown. He was a canon regular of the priory of St Andrews, the most flourishing and important religious establishment in the kingdom; and in or before the year 1395, he was elected prior of St Serf's inch, in Lochleven.[1] Of this he himself gives an account in his "Cronykil."
Of my defautte it is my name
Be baptisme, Andrew of Wyntowne,
Of Sanct Andrews, a chanoune
Regulare: but, noucht forthi
Of thaim al the lest worthy.
Bot of thair grace and thair favoure
I wes, but[2] meryt, made prioure
Of the ynch within Lochlevyne.
Innes mentions "several authentic acts or public instruments of Wyntown, as prior, from 1395 till 1413, in 'Extracts from the Register of the Priory of St Andrews,'" which points out part of the period of his priorship; and as the death of Robert, duke of Albany, is noticed in the "Cronykil," Wyntown must have survived till beyond 1420, the year in which the duke died. Supposing, as is probable, that he brought down his narrative of events to the latest period of his life, we may conjecture his death to have occurred not long after the above date.
It was at the request of "Schyr Jhone of the Wemys," ancestor of the earls of Wemyss,[3] that Wyntown undertook his Chronicle;[4] which, although the first historical record of Scotland in our own language, was suffered to lie neglected for several centuries. In 1795, Mr David Macpherson laid before the public an admirable edition of that part of it, which more particularly relates to Scotland, accompanied with a series of valuable annotations. Like most other old chroniclers, Wyntown, in his history, goes as far back as the creation, and takes a general view of the world, before entering upon the proper business of his undertaking. He treats of angels, of the generations of Cain and Seth, of the primeval race of giants, of the confusion of tongues, of the situation of India, Egypt, Africa, and Europe, and of other equally recondite subjects, before he adventures upon the history of Scotland; so that five of the nine books into which his Chronicle is divided, are taken up with matter, which, however edifying and instructive at the time, is of no service to the modern historical inquirer. Mr Macpherson, therefore, in his edition, has suppressed all the extraneous and foreign appendages, only preserving the metrical contents of the chapters, by which the reader may know the nature of what is withheld; and taking care that nothing which relates to the British islands, whether true or fabulous, is overlooked. It is not likely that any future editor of Wyntown will adopt a different plan; so that those parts which Mr Macpherson has
- ↑ St Serf is the name of a small island in that beautiful loch, not far from the island which contains the castle of Lochleven, celebrated as the prison-house of the queen of Scots.
- ↑ But, without.
- ↑ A younger son of this family settled in the Venetian territories, about 1600; and a copy of Wyntown's work is in the possession of his descendants.
- ↑ Book i. Prologue, 1. 54.
