David Doig

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This soci ...

LLD (1719–1800) was a Scottish educator, philologist and writer known for historical and philosophical works. He was Rector of Stirling High School from 1760 to 1800. Doig is also believed to have been the inventor of the tartan pattern now associated with Burberry. David Doig Silhouette

Life

David was born 14 Feb 1719 at Mill of Melgund,

Aberlemno Aberlemno ( gd, Obar Leamhnach, IPA: �opəɾˈʎɛunəx is a parish and small village in the Scottish council area of Angus. It is noted for three large carved Pictish stones (and one fragment) dating from the 7th and 8th centuries AD (Histori ...

, Angus, son of David Doig and Ann Sturrock. His father, who was a small farmer, died while he was an infant, and his mother married again. He was successful in a Latin competition for a bursary at the University of St. Andrews. Having finished the classical and philosophical course and proceeded B.A., he began the study of divinity, but scruples regarding the Westminster Confession of Faith prevented him from entering the ministry of the Church of Scotland. Doig taught from 1749 in the parochial schools of Monifieth,

Kennoway Kennoway is a village in Fife, Scotland, near the larger population centres in the area of Leven and Methil. It had an estimated population of in . It is about three miles inland from the Firth of Forth, north of Leven. This position gave it i ...

and Falkland, Fifeshire. His reputation then gained for him the rectorship of the grammar school of Stirling, a post he filled for over 40 years. In addition to Greek and Latin Doig had mastered Hebrew and Arabic. The University of Glasgow conferred on him the honorary degree of LL.D., and on the same day he received from St. Andrews his diploma as M.A. He was also elected a fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...

, and a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. Doig was elected a Fellow of the

in 1798. His proposers were Dr James Gregory,

Andrew Dalzell Andrew Dalzell (sometimes shown as Andrew Dalzel or Andrew Dalziel) FRSE (1742–1806) was a Scottish scholar and prominent figure during the Scottish Enlightenment. In 1783 he was a co-founder of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. Life He was b ...

, and John Playfair. Doig died in Stirling on 16 March 1800, aged 81. He is buried in the Holy Rude Cemetery next to

Stirling Castle Stirling Castle, located in Stirling, is one of the largest and most important castles in Scotland, both historically and architecturally. The castle sits atop Castle Hill, an intrusive crag, which forms part of the Stirling Sill geological ...

. A mural tablet, with an inscription in commemoration of his virtues and learning, was raised by his friend

John Ramsay of Ochtertyre John Ramsay of Ochtertyre FRSE FSAScot (1736–1814) was a Scottish writer and antiquarian. A renowned letter-writer even in his own lifetime, most of his extensive correspondence has since been lost. His home in Stirlingshire is near Blair Drummo ...

. The town of Stirling also erected a marble monument to his memory, with a Latin epitaph written by himself.

Family

Doig was married to Isabella Janet Bower (1727-1762) in Monifieth on 17 November 1749. They had children: Isabella, Ann, Jean, David, George, and Patrick. Their daughter Isabella (1751-1819) married Dr. John Aird (c.1740-1790) with sons William, David, and John. The next four children died young. Patrick Doig (1762-1833) married Jane Austin (1781-1849)with a son David (1812-1819); Patrick later became a medical doctor in Antigua.

Works

Doig's first known appearance in print was some twenty pages of annotation on the '' Gaberlunzie-man'', in an edition of that and another old Scottish poem, ''

Christ's Kirk on the Green "Christis Kirk on the Green" is an anonymous Middle Scots poem in 22 stanzas, now believed to have been written around the year 1500, giving a comic account of a brawl at a country fair. It was for many years mistakenly attributed either to James ...

'', published in 1782 by his friend and neighbour

John Callander John Callander (1722–1789) of Craigforth in Stirlingshire was a Scottish antiquary and plagiarist. Life He was the son of James Callander, and Katherine Mackenzie, daughter of Sir Kenneth Mackenzie of Cromarty. He passed advocate at the Scotti ...

of Craigforth. ''Two Letters on the Savage State, addressed to the late Lord Kaims'' (London, 1792) attacked the views of

Lord Kames Henry Home, Lord Kames (169627 December 1782) was a Scottish writer, philosopher, advocate, judge, and agricultural improver. A central figure of the Scottish Enlightenment, a founding member of the Philosophical Society of Edinburgh, and act ...

in ''

Sketches of the History of Man Conjectural history is a type of historiography isolated in the 1790s by Dugald Stewart, who termed it "theoretical or conjectural history," as prevalent in the historians and early social scientists of the Scottish Enlightenment. As Stewart saw it, ...

'' (1774). The first of the letters, from 1775, had been sent to Kames, who was passing the Christmas vacation a few miles from Stirling, and who invited Doig to dinner next day. Doig's next publication was ''Extracts from a Poem on the Prospect from Stirling Castle'' (Stirling, 1796). He contributed to vol. iii. of the ''Transactions'' of the Royal Society of Edinburgh a dissertation "On the Ancient Hellenes". He also wrote in the ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' third edition the articles on "Mythology", "Mysteries", and "Philology". They brought Doig correspondence with William Vincent and

Jacob Bryant Jacob Bryant (1715–1804) was an English scholar and mythographer, who has been described as "the outstanding figure among the mythagogues who flourished in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries." Life Bryant was born at Plymouth ...

. Besides Latin and English poems Doig left some treatises in manuscript. A partial list was in ''Encyclopædia Britannica'', 8th edit. viii. 92.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Doig, David 1719 births 1800 deaths 18th-century Scottish writers Scottish poets Scottish educators Philosophy writers