An original manuscript in the hand of the Enlightenment poet and playwright Allan Ramsay has entered the collection of the National Library of Scotland, following its discovery by Great Western Auctions’ specialists. Consigned from a Central Scotland house clearance, the manuscript was uncovered in complete obscurity, amidst a bundle of miscellaneous ephemera and unframed artworks.

In 1719, Allan Ramsay penned his Address to the Town-Council of Edinburgh, as an appeal that they legislate against the pirating of his works. This they duly did, decreeing that vendors of Ramsay’s verse were to retain only one third of their profits, with the majority share payable to Ramsay. Prior to now, no manuscript copy of the Address was known to exist.

This significant literary historical discovery sheds new light on Ramsay’s compositional process, as in the seventh line of the poem we see the poet revising his original word choice (unrecorded prior to now). Also of interest is the format in which Ramsay presents his words, that of a letter literally addressed to named members of the Council. It may be the case that it was the receipt of this very document that prompted their intervention.

          Allan Ramsay was a titanic figure in the early Scottish Enlightenment. As a poet and playwright, as well as a collector of verse, he did much to crystalise the Scottish literary tradition. His influence can be strongly felt through the work of subsequent writers, among them Burns, Fergusson and Scott. He is commemorated in a striking full-length statue, situated in Edinburgh’s Princes Street Gardens, as well the Ramsay Monument in Penicuik, erected as a tribute by his friend Sir James Clerk.