Wyntoun, ANDREW OF

Wyntoun, ANDREW OF, an old rhyming Scottish chronicler, about whom we know only that he was a canon regular of St Andrews, who about 1395 became prior of the monastery of St Serf on Lochleven, and that he wrote The Orygynale Cronykil of Scotland. Though with the usual proportion of extravagant fable, his work is not without considerable historical importance; while philologically it has very distinct value, as a specimen of the old Scotch, then as nearly as might be identical with the contemporary dialect of England. The Cronykil is brought down to 1406, and consists of nine books or cantos, of which only the last four are devoted to Scottish history; the first five giving a fragmentary outline of the history and geography of the ancient world. From his quotations Wyntoun seems to have been a well-read scholar for his time. His style is not essentially different from Barbour's, and his versification is the same—the pleasant octosyllabic. David Maepheron edited the Scottish portion (2 vols. 1795); and a complete edition was published by David Laing in the 'Historians of Scotland' series (3 vols. 1872-79).