Thomas Ruddiman

Thomas Ruddiman(1674-1757), Scottish classical scholar, was born in October 1674, at Raggal, Banffshire. His father, James Ruddiman, was a respectable farmer, strongly attached to the monarchy, an attachment which he showed by bursting into tears on hearing of the death of Charles II.

Thomas was educated at Aberdeen University, and, through the influence of Dr Archibald Pitcairne, became an assistant in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh. His chief writings at this period were editions of Florence Wilson's De Animi Tranquillitate Dialogus (1707), and the Cantici Solomonis Paraphrasis Poetica (1709) of Arthur Johnston (1587-1641), editor of the Deliciae Poetarum Scotorum. On the death of Dr Pitcairne he edited his friend's Latin verses, and arranged for the sale of his valuable library to Peter the Great of Russia.

In 1714 he published Rudiments of the Latin Tongue, which became the standard text in Scottish schools.

In 1715 he edited, with notes and annotations, the works of George Buchanan in two volumes. As Ruddiman was a Jacobite, the liberal views of Buchanan seemed to him to call for frequent censure, and a society of scholars was formed in Edinburgh to "vindicate that incomparably learned and pious author from the calumnies of Mr Thomas Ruddiman".

In 1715, Ruddiman founded a successful printing business, and in 1728 was appointed printer to the university. He acquired the Caledonian Mercury in 1729, and in 1730 was appointed keeper of the Advocates' Library, resigning in 1752.

He died in Edinburgh, on 19th January 1757, and is buried in Greyfriars Kirkyard. His memorial reads:

SACRED TO THE MEMORY OF THAT CELEBRATED SCHOLAR AND WORTHY MAN,

THOMAS RUDDIMAN, A. M.,

KEEPER OF THE ADVOCATES’ LIBRARY NEAR FIFTY YEARS.

Born, October, 1674, within three miles of the town of Banff;

Died at Edinburgh, 19th January, 1757, In his eighty-third year.

Post obitum, benefacta manent, aeternaque virtus,

Non metuit Stygiis ne rapiatur aquis

His third wife Anne continued her husband's business after his death, suing a competitor who threatened to infringe her copyright on 'The Rudiments of the Latin Tongue'. A portrait of Anne Smith, Mrs Thomas Ruddiman (1729 - 1769), the third wife of Thomas Ruddiman was painted by William Denune in 1749 and hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in Edinburgh. The publishing business continued long after Thomas Ruddiman's death; Robert Fergusson's first Scots poem was published appeared on 2nd January 1772, in Ruddiman's Weekly Magazine, (or Edinburgh Amusement), where most of his best poems thereafter first appeared.

Apart from the works already mentioned, the following writings of Ruddiman deserve notice: An edition of Gavin Douglas's Aeneid of Virgil (1710); the editing and completion of Anderson's Selectus Diplomatum et Numismatum Scotiae Thesaurus (1739); -Catalogue of the Advocates' Library (1733-42); and a famous edition of Livy (1751). He also helped Joseph Ames with the Typographical Antiquities.

Writing in 1766, Dr Samuel Johnson, after reproving Boswell for some bad Latin, adds - "Ruddiman is dead." When Boswell proposed to write Ruddiman's life, "I should take pleasure in helping you to do honour to him," said Johnson.

References

• Chalmers's Life of Ruddiman (1794) Scots Magazine January 7, 1757.
• Thomas Ruddiman Encyclopedia Britannica eleventh edition.