| Savant, professor, author; b., as he himself
states at Cliftbog, Scotland, 23 August, 1579; d. at Bologna Italy, 6
September 1625: son of Thomas, Baron of Muresk, Auchterless, and
Killesmont, Aberdeenshire, and Jane Leslie, sister to the Baron of
Balquhain; educated t the schools of Turriff and Aberdeen. His troubulous
life began early. On leaving school, aged ten he went to Cambridge,
leaving it shortly for Paris. Illness occasioned his removal to Louvain,
whence, having attracted the notice of a representative of the Holy See,
he was taken to Rome, and there provided with a pension for his education
in a papal seminary. Through failing health he returned northwards to
Tournai, but was immediately transferred to Douai, means being forthcoming
through royal bounty. On completion of a three years' course he returned
to Tournai as professor of humanities. Tournai, however, he forsook for
Paris, where, after graduating in canon law, he occupied at the age of
seventeen, a professorial chair in the College de Navarre. He could not
remain here either, and, after an interval in Poitou, he became professor
of humanities again, this time at Toulouse. Before long, zeal in local
dissentions sent him adrift once more. Declining a chair of philosophy at
Montpellier, he successfully competed for one of oratory at Nimes. From
this he was suspended, a lawsuit followed in vindication of his integrity.
The post of tutor to the son of Marechal de Saint-Luc he lost through
unfriendly relations with the family of his patron. Once more adrift, he
visited Scotland vainly begged assistance from Kith and kin, and, through
Protestant intrigue, failed to recover his family estates, which had been
parted with by his father. Seven years of professorship followed in Paris,
at the end of which he was invited to reside in London in the capacity of
historian to James I. He married in England, but only to bring on himself
domestic misfortune. Anglican influence having procured royal dismissal,
he left for Italy, and occupied under grand ducal auspices the chair of
Civil law in Florence. Further trouble led to his last change. In disgrace
with the grand duke, he passed through Bologna, and there was provided
with a chair in humanities. Even here he had his troubles, and had to
clear himself of a suspicion of unorthodoxy before the Inquisition. He
lies buried in the church of St. Dominic at Bologna,
Dempster's worth as an autobiographer and
historian is much discounted by manifest errors and by immoderate
self-praise and zeal for the exaltation of his country. An unrestrained
temper and resentful disposition, added to a harsh exterior, were, in
spite of learning and good qualities, the cause of his unpopularity and
many misfortunes. The seventeenth century Irish ecclesiastical historians
generally resented Dempster's dishonest attempts to claim for Scotland
many saints and worthies of Irish birth. John Colgan, John Lynch and
Stephen White, all eminent scholars entered against him (see W.T. Doherty,
Inis-Owen and Triconnell, Dublin 1895, pp108-16).
The chief of his many writings are:
“Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Scotorum” published posthumously at
Bologna, 1627; republished by Bannatyne Club, Edinburgh, 1829;
“Antiquitatum Romanarum Corpus Absolutissimum” “(Paris, 1613,1743);
“De Erutruria Regali”, brought out during the Florentine professorship
(latest edition, 1723-4); “Keraunos kai Hobellos” in Glossam
librorum IV. Institutionum Justiniani” (Bologna, 1622), edition of
Claudian; annotated edition of Benedetto Accolti’s “De Bello a
Christianis contra Barbaros Gesto” (Florence, 1623; Groningen, 1731);
annotated edition of Aldrovandi’s “Quadrupedum omnium bisulcorum
Historia” (Florence, 1623,1647). His minor works include: tragedies,
poems, especially “Musica Recidiva” thrice reprinted during his life.
DEMPSTER, Autobiography., n. 1210 in
Hist Eccl Scotia(Edinburgh 1829); IRVING, Preface to
DEMPSTER,Hist Eccl Scotae; CHAMBERS,Dictionary of Eminent
Scotsmen (Edinburgh, 1855); BRADLEY in Dict. of Nat Biog.(London,
1888),s.v.; BAYLE, Dictionary.
JEROME POLLARD-URQUHART
Transcribed by C.A. Montgomery |
