Scottish Authors > Alexander Scott Poet c.1515-1583

Scott's date of birth is uncertain, but was probably around 1515. Little is known of his early life and career. From his work, however, it is evident that he was familiar with Dalkeith and Edinburgh, and his friendship with Alexander Montgomerie and other courtiers indicates residence in the capital.

Scott was presented to the prebend of the Chapel Royal, Stirling in 1539 and in 1548 he became musician and organist at lnchmahome Priory. Following the death of the Priory's commendator, Robert Erskine, at the Battle of Pinkie, 1547, he composed Lament of the Master of Erskine.

Through his connections with the Erskine family Scott visited France and came into contact with the court of Mary, Queen of Scots, there. His concern with the political and religious issues of the time are revealed in Ane New Year gift to the Queen Mary, when she come first hame, 1562. The poem is an even-handed appeal to the young Queen, denouncing the corrupt ways of the Catholic Church and warning against the "cuvatyce of geir" among Reformers. By 1565 Scott was a canon at Inchaffray in Perthshire and in 1567 he purchased Nether Petledie estate in Fife and became a wealthy landowner.

It appears that he was married. To the poem To Luve unluvit was added a footnote that it was written "quhen his wife left him". The accuracy of this is open to doubt. It may have been appended by Scott himself; equally it may be by a scribe who copied the poem into the Bannatyne manuscript.

All of Scott's thirty six extant poems are to be found in the Bannatyne manuscript which contains the only contemporary collection of his work. Otherwise, he would be known only by mention in a sonnet by Montgomerie.

In the main, the poems fall into two categories: courtly love lyrics, some of which were composed to dance tunes, and poems describing the spectrum of emotions experienced by those in love.

Scott's namesake and editor of the 1952 collection of his work describes him as:

... a weathercock of the emotions, twirling about in the winds of passion and pointing now to praise, now to dispraise, as the mood of the moment directs.

In successfully portraying the contradictions and confusions of love Scott is considered by many to be the finest Scottish love poet before Burns.

Although included among the "makars", he has been compared with the English poet, Sir Thomas Wyatt. A Rondel of love is well-known and has been much anthologised:

Lo! What it is to love,

Learn ye, that list to prove,

Be me, I say, that no ways may

The grund of grief remove,

Bot still decay, both nicht and day;

Lo! What it is to love.

Although uncertain, the date of Alexander Scott's death is usually given as 1583.

Alan Reid

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