Robert Aytoun
{{short description|Scottish writer}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2019}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Robert Aytoun
| image = Robert Ayton memorial, Westminster Abbey 03.jpg
| birth_date = c. 1570
| death_date = {{death year and age|1638|1570}}
| resting_place = Westminster Abbey
| occupation = lawyer, poet
| nationality = Scottish
| notable_works = Diophantus and Charidora
| alma_mater = University of St Andrews
}}
Sir Robert Aytoun or AytonOr, less often, Aiton or Aitoun, forms which he used himself, see Charles Rogers, 'Memoir and Poems of Sir Robert Aytoun', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, vol. 1 (London, 1875), p. 107. (c. 1570–1638) was a Scottish poet.
Biography
Aytoun was the son of Andrew Ayton of Kinaldie Castle, in Fife, Scotland, and Mary Lundie.Charles Roger, Poems of Robert Ayton (Edinburgh, 1844), p. xxiii: Charles Rogers, 'Memoir and Poems of Sir Robert Aytoun', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, vol. 1 (London, 1875), p. 101.
Aytoun and his elder brother John entered St Leonard's College in St Andrews in 1584.Charles Roger, Poems of Robert Ayton (Edinburgh, 1844), p. xxiv. After graduating MA from St Andrews in 1588, he studied civil law at Paris.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911|p=77}}{{sfn|Cousin|1910}}
He appears to have been well known to his literary contemporaries in Scotland and England. He became a groom in the privy chamber of King James in succession to Laurence Marbury, was knighted and became a gentleman of the bedchamber in 1612.Charles Rogers, 'Memoir and Poems of Sir Robert Aytoun', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, vol. 1 (London, 1875), pp. 102-3. He became secretary and master of requests to Anne of Denmark in succession to another Scottish poet, William Fowler.Joseph Massey, 'The Stuart Consorts and Scotland', Aidan Norrie, Tudor and Stuart Consorts: Power, Influence, and Dynasty (Palgrave Macmillan, 2022), p. 206: Linda Levy Peck, Court Patronage and Corruption in Early Stuart England (Routledge, London, 1993), p. 68. He was sent as ambassador to Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor in 1609. He was later secretary to Henrietta Maria.Charles Roger, Poems of Robert Ayton (Edinburgh, 1844), p. xxvi-xxxiv.
He wrote poems in Latin, Greek, and English, and was one of the first Scots to write in standard English. His major work was Diophantus and Charidora.{{sfn|Cousin|1910}}
Inconstancy Upbraided is perhaps the best of his short poems. He is credited with a little poem, Old Long Syne, which probably suggested Robert Burns's famous Auld Lang Syne.{{sfn|Cousin|1910}}
Aytoun died at Whitehall Palace and is buried in the south ambulatory area of in Westminster Abbey.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911|p= 77}} The monument includes a bronze bust, attributed, variously, to either Hubert Le Sueur or Francesco Fanelli.Charles Rogers, 'Memoir and Poems of Sir Robert Aytoun', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, vol. 1 (London, 1875), p. 110.{{cite web|url=https://www.westminster-abbey.org/abbey-commemorations/commemorations/robert-ayton|title=Robert Ayton |website=Westminster Abbey |access-date=16 September 2022}} Amongst his bequests, Aytoun gave a diamond hatband to William Murray and his French bed to Jane Whorwood.Charles Rogers, 'Memoir and Poems of Sir Robert Aytoun', Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, vol. 1 (London, 1875), pp. 112.
Bothwell and Little Jock Elliot
He is also the author of a ballad called "Bothwell" about the battle fought by James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell with the border reiver, John Elliot of Park, also known as Little Jock Elliot or Little Jock of the Park. The ballad recounts how Bothwell, in attempting to arrest Little Jock Elliot, suffers life-threatening wounds, though he ends by slaying his foe. Ayton was eight years old at the time Bothwell perished in a dungeon in Denmark, and hence must have heard about the attempted arrest of Elliot by people familiar with the story, particularly as Bothwell was a figure of national renown.{{citation needed|date=April 2016}}
The Border ballad "Little Jock Elliot" celebrates, amongst other events, the achievements of Little Jock Elliot on this occasion and has the refrain "My name is little Jock Elliot and wha daur meddle wi' me!". This latter ballad, of indeterminate date, also implicitly states that Little Jock Elliot survived the encounter with Bothwell.{{citation needed|date=April 2016}}
Notes
{{Reflist}}
References
- {{cite EB1911|wstitle=Aytoun, Sir Robert |volume=3 |page=77 }}
Attribution:
- {{SBDEL|wstitle=Ayton, Sir Robert}}
Further reading
- {{Cite EB9|wstitle=Ayton, Sir Robert|volume=3 |page=165}}
- {{cite DNB |last=Grosart |first=Alexander Balloch |wstitle=Ayton, Robert|volume=2 |pages=300–302|ref={{sfnref|Cousin|1910}}}}
- {{cite encyclopedia |first=M.D. |last=Law |title=Aytoun, Sir Robert (1570-1638) |encyclopedia=Chambers's Encyclopædia |location=London |publisher=George Newnes |year=1961 |volume=2 |page=15}}
- {{Eminent Scotsmen|Ayton, (Sir) Robert|1|83-86}}
- Smith, Sydney Goodsir (1961), review of Helena Mennie Shire (ed.), Poems and Songs of Sir Robert Ayton, in Gordon, Giles and Scott-Moncrieff, Michael (eds.), New Saltire: Summer 1961, The Saltire Society, Edinburgh, pp. 83 & 84.
External links
{{wikisource|works=or}}
- [https://books.google.com/books?id=8kxtAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA170&dq=ayton%27s+ballad,+%22bothwell%22 "Bothwell"]
- {{Internet Archive author |sname=Robert Aytoun}}
- {{Librivox author |id=8671}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ayton, Robert}}
Category:Household of Anne of Denmark
Category:Alumni of the University of St Andrews
Category:University of Paris alumni
Category:Burials at Westminster Abbey
Category:16th-century Scottish male writers
Category:16th-century Scottish poets
Category:17th-century Scottish poets