Scotland in the Eighteenth Century: Union and Enlightenment by David W. Allan

Author:David W. Allan [Allan, David W.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History
ISBN: 9780582382473
Goodreads: 14778008
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2001-10-19T00:00:00+00:00

Social institutions

Education brooked large in contemporary assessments of what was most praiseworthy about Scotland’s distinctive social fabric. Since the Reformation, during which the schools and universities had been appropriated for the service of a presbyterian church and the creation of a pious Protestant society, teaching had been accorded paramount importance. Such views were famously expressed in the First Book of Discipline (1560). This articulated a vision of the Scots as a literate people, familiar with scripture and thus capable of fulfilling their destiny as a godly and, later, a Covenanted nation. The Williamite Revolution of 1689–90 empowered a new generation of presbyterian enthusiasts, leading to redoubled emphasis upon these aspirations, as well as to some further practical progress. An Act of 1696 duly confirmed the principle that there should be a school in every parish: the ‘dominie’ (the teacher) would be supported by a tax on the heritors, enforced, if necessary, by the commission of supply.

Apart from in the Highlands and islands, where widespread non-presbyterianism and the unmanageable size of parishes created intractable problems (Harris, for example, included seven inhabited islands and measured forty-eight miles by twenty-four), Scotland’s rural schools actually functioned by 1700 in a manner similar to that formally envisaged. Children paid a small fee to attend: education was far too precious to be treated as a free good. It was expected, however, that the kirk session would support the very poor. This mechanism, reinforced by a combination of parental aspiration and clerical pressure, ensured that most rural Scots received some elementary education. Many burghs also had their own schools. Overseen by the council and the parish clergy, the ‘grammar schools’, many with medieval origins, delivered not only an elementary but a more advanced Latin-based education to boys moving towards university and the traditional professions. Large burghs like Edinburgh, with its endowed welfare institutions such as Watson’s, Heriot’s and the Merchants’ Maiden and Trades Maiden Hospitals, also made supplementary provision for the children of needy burgesses.

All types of school, whether rural or urban, were, by our standards, somewhat limited in their aims. Yet constant emphasis upon a narrow range of attainments meant that basic literacy, numeracy and some knowledge of the catechism were already within the reach of many, and, in the Lowlands, most. Scottish literacy was by no means as exceptional as is sometimes thought: Highland literacy was among the worst in Europe; the Lowlands were comparable with northern England. But it was nevertheless impressive for a relatively poor and thinly populated country. In practice, literacy was much higher among males: in 1750 roughly 65 per cent of Lowland men giving evidence in criminal trials could sign their name, against 15–30 per cent of women. Predictably, it was also better among the respectable and the prosperous: in the period 1700–70, perhaps 97 per cent of lairds and 82 per cent of craftsmen and traders, but only 45 per cent of servants, could sign. Nor can literacy be interpreted simplistically. It is open to question whether signing one’s

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