Robert Kirk (folklorist)
Robert Kirk (9 December 1644 – 14 May 1692) was a minister, Gaelic scholar and folklorist, best known for The Secret Commonwealth, a treatise on fairy folklore, witchcraft, ghosts, and second sight, a type of extrasensory perception described as a phenomenon by the people of the Scottish Highlands.
Folklorist Stewart Sanderson and mythologist Marina Warner called Kirk's collection of supernatural tales one of the most important and significant works on the subject of fairies and second sight.
[2] Christian philosopher and religious studies scholar David Bentley Hart has praised Kirk for writing The Secret Commonwealth to defend "harmless Scottish country folk who innocently dabbled in the lore of their culture" and "found themselves arraigned by Presbyterian courts for practicing the black arts.
Gentleman scientist Robert Boyle financed the publication of the Gaelic Bible and pursued inquiries into Kirk's reports of second sight.
Multiple editions of The Secret Commonwealth have since been published, with notable scholarly analysis by Sanderson, Mario M. Rossi, and Michael Hunter.
[14] During its preparation Kirk learned that the synod of Argyll intended to bring out a rival version, and stories are told of how he used to keep himself awake while working to be first in the field.
[12] In 1689, Kirk was called to London to superintend the printing of An Biobla Naomhtha, the Gaelic Bible that had begun decades earlier under the direction of Bishop William Bedell.
Folklorist Stewart Sanderson and mythologist Marina Warner called Kirk's collection of supernatural tales one of the most important and significant works on the subject of fairies and second sight.
Kirk probably encountered opposition to his supernatural beliefs in the secular and sceptical climate of 17th century coffeehouses in Restoration London, during his visit in 1689.
More than a century would pass before the book was finally released by Scottish author Walter Scott in 1815 under the title The Secret Commonwealth or an Essay on the Nature and Actions of the Subterranean (and for the most part) Invisible People heretofore going under the names of Fauns and Fairies, or the like, among the Low Country Scots as described by those who have second sight, 1691.
These bodies be so pliable through the sublety of Spirits that agitate them, that they can make them appear or disappear at pleasure.Andrew Lang published a second edition of the book in 1893, under the title The Secret Commonwealth of Elves, Fauns and Fairies,[20] followed by a 1933 version with an introduction by Robert Bontine Cunninghame Graham.
Multiple editions of The Secret Commonwealth have since been published, with notable scholarly analysis by Sanderson, Mario M. Rossi, and Michael Hunter.
