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PATRICK ABERCROMBY (1656–c.-1716)

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Originally appearing in Volume V01, Page 44 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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PATRICK ABERCROMBY (1656–c.-1716)  , Scottish physician and antiquarian, was the third son of Alexander Abercromby of Fetterneir in
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Aberdeenshire, and
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brother of Francis Aber- cromby, who was created Lord Glasford by James II . He was born at
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Forfar in 1656 apparently of a
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Roman Catholic
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family . Intending to become a doctor of
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medicine he entered the university of St Andrews, where he took his degree of M.D. in 1685, but apparently he spent most of his youthful years abroad . It has been stated that he attended the university of Paris . The Discourse of Wit (1685), sometimes assigned to him, belongs to Dr David Abercromby (q.v.) . On his return to Scotland, he is found practising as a physician in
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Edinburgh, where, besides his professional duties, he gave himself with characteristic zeal to the study of antiquities . He was appointed physician to James II. in 1685, but the revolution deprived him of the
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post . Living during the agitations for the union of England and Scotland, he took
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part in the war of
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pamphlets inaugurated and sustained by prominent men on both sides of the Border, and he crossed swords with no less redoubtable a foe than Daniel Defoe in his Advantages of the Act of Security compared with those of the intended Union (Edinburgh, 1707), and A Vindication of the Same against Mr De Foe (ibid.) . A minor
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literary
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work of Abercromby's was a
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translation of
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Jean de Beaugue's Histoire de la guerre d'Ecosse (1556) which appeared in 1707 . But the work with which his name is permanently associated is his Martial Atchievements of the Scots Nation, issued in two large folios, vol. i . 1711, vol. ii . 1716 .

In the

title-page and preface to vol. i. he disclaims the ambition of being an historian, but in vol. ii., in title-page and preface alike, he is no longer a
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simple biographer, but an historian . Even though, read in the
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light of later researches, much of the first
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volume must necessarily be relegated to the region of the mythical, none the less was the historian a laborious and accomplished reader and investigator of all available authorities, as well
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manuscript as printed; while the roll of names of those who aided him includes every man of note in Scotland at the time, from
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Sir Thomas Craig and Sir George Mackenzie to Alexander Nisbet and Thomas Ruddiman . The date of Abercromby's
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death is uncertain . It has been variously assigned to 1715, 1716, 1720, and 1726, and it is usually added that he
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left a widow in
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great poverty . The
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Memoirs of the Abercrombys, commonly attributed to him, do not appear to have been published . See Robert Chambers, Eminent Scotsmen, s.v.; William Anderson, Scottish Nation, s.v.; Alexander Chalmers, Biog . Dict., s.v.; George Chalmers,
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Life of Ruddiman; William Lee, Defoe .

End of Article: PATRICK ABERCROMBY (1656–c.-1716)
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