William Forbes SkeneWSFRSEFSA(Scot)DCLLLD (7 June 1809 – 29 August 1892), was aScottish lawyer, historian andantiquary.
He co-founded the Scottish legal firmSkene Edwards which was prominent throughout the 20th century but disappeared in 2008 when it merged with Morton Fraser.[1]
He was born inInverey, the second son ofSir Walter Scott's friend,James Skene (1775–1864), ofRubislaw, nearAberdeen, and his wife, Jane Forbes, daughter ofSir William Forbes, 6th Baronet of Pitsligo.[2]
The family moved to Edinburgh in 1817, originally living with his uncle,Andrew Skene then from 1820 living at 126Princes Street facingEdinburgh Castle.[3]
He was educated at theHigh School inEdinburgh.[4] He was then apprenticed as a lawyer first to Francis Wilson WS at Parliament Square then toHenry Jardine WS also at Parliament Square.[3]
He then studied law at theUniversity of St Andrews andEdinburgh University, also taking a special interest in the study ofCelticphilology andliterature. In 1832, he became aWriter to the Signet (WS), and shortly afterwards obtained an official appointment in the bill department of theCourt of Session, which he held until 1865. His early interest in the history and antiquities of theScottish Highlands bore its first fruit in 1837, when he publishedThe Highlanders of Scotland, their Origin, History and Antiquities.
In 1847, during theHighland Potato Famine, he was appointed Secretary to the Central Board for Highland Relief. In this position he worked closely withSir Charles Trevelyan, Assistant Secretary to theTreasury.
In 1859 he was elected a Fellow of theRoyal Society of Edinburgh his proposer beingCosmo Innes. He served as the society's vice president from 1869 to 1871.[2]
His chief work, however, is hisCeltic Scotland, a History of Ancient Alban (3 vols., Edinburgh, 1876–1880), perhaps the most important contribution toScottish history written during the 19th century. In 1879 he was made aDoctor of Civil Law (DCL) of theUniversity of Oxford, and in 1881Historiographer Royal for Scotland.
William Forbes Skene was a leading member of the congregation of St Vincent's Scottish Episcopal Church in St Vincent Street inStockbridge in north Edinburgh. He is commemorated there by a prominent memorial on the south wall of the nave. An avowed Evangelical, he had argued that, since the Scottish Episcopal Church's General Synod of 1863 had established the English Book of Common Prayer as the primary authority for the Church's worship and the Scottish Episcopal Church had adopted the Church of England's Thirty Nine Articles as a doctrinal yardstick, for St Vincent's to remain outside that church could no longer be justified.[5]
In his final years he had offices at 5 Albyn Place on theMoray Estate and lived at 27 Inverleith Row.[6]
He died unmarried and childless inEdinburgh on 29 August 1892. He is buried with his family in St Johns Episcopal Churchyard onPrinces Street. The graves lie in the south-east chapel and are marked by a bronze plaque.
The most important of Skene's other works are: editions ofJohn of Fordun'sChronica gentis Scotorum (Edinburgh, 1871–1872); of theFour Ancient Books of Wales (Edinburgh, 1868); of theChronicles of the Picts and Scots (Edinburgh, 1867); and ofAdomnán'sVita S. Columbae (Edinburgh, 1874); anEssay on the CoronationStone of Scone (Edinburgh, 1869); andMemorials of the Family of Skene of Skene (Aberdeen, 1887),Celtic Scotland (1880) One of Skene's harshest critics was the Scottish philologistAlexander Macbain.
This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Skene, William Forbes".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 25 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 186.
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