Sir John Clerk, 2nd Baronet (c. 1676 – 4 October 1755) was a Scottish politician, lawyer, judge and composer.

For upwards of twenty years he also carried on a learned correspondence with Roger Gale, the English antiquary, which forms a portion of the Reliquiae Britannica of 1782.

[6] Sir John Clerk was one of the friends and patrons of the poet Allan Ramsay who, during his latter years, spent much of his time at Penicuik House.

His son, Sir James Clerk, erected at the family seat an obelisk to Ramsay's memory.

[6] Clerk had a musical bent also, and while in Rome may have been tutored by the Baroque composer Arcangelo Corelli,[8] but his own work has often been overlooked, primarily since the only record of his composition seems to be his own papers.

[4] He unsuccessfully courted Susanna, daughter of Sir Archibald Kennedy of Culzean, Baronet (ancestor of the Marquess of Ailsa) and that correspondence is in the National Archives.