John Adamson (1576–1651?)

Adamson graduated from Edinburgh with MA in 1597, and was made Regent of Philosophy. In 1589 he became Professor of Philosophy at Edinburgh, resigning in 1604 to take up ministry in Haddington, North Berwick, and later in 1609 admitted to the presbytery of Liberton near Edinburgh. In 1606 he married Marion Auchmoutie, and had two children.

By 1616 he was a member of the Aberdeen Assembly, where he, with two others, was tasked to develop a form of liturgy and a catechism for the Church. In 1617 he was leader of the College Regents that disputed before King James VI at Stirling, and a year later he collected all the Latin and Greek greetings to James IV, on his arrival in Scotland, and published them as 'The Muses Welcome to the High and Mighty Prince James' (1618). He produced a similar work with the visit of Charles I to Scotland, entitled 'Eisodia musarum Edinensium in Caroli Regis, Musarum Tutani, ingressu in Scotiam' (1633).

With the expulsion of Robert Boyd, he was assumed Principal of the University of Edinburgh in 1623. Adamson was an 'elegant scholar' and produced many works. He wrote the Latin catalogue for the books bequeathed to the University library by William Drummond of Hawthornden in 1627, and also produced a Latin Catechism for students in that same year. Famously, he bequeathed George Buchanan's skull to the University.

The exact date of his death is unknown, but there are records of him living around the time of May 1651. It is assumed he died not long after.