Peter Young (tutor)

Sir Peter Young (1544–1628) was a Scottish diplomat, tutor to James VI of Scotland.

Young was the second son of John Young, burgess of Edinburgh and Dundee, and of Margaret, daughter of Walter Scrymgeour of Glasswell, and was born at Dundee on 15 August 1544. His mother was related to the Scrymgeours of Dudhope (later ennobled with the title of Earl of Dundee), and his father settled in Dundee at the time of his marriage (1541). John Young's eldest son, John (1542–1584), was provost of the collegiate church of Dysart; the third son, Alexander, usher of the king's privy chamber to James VI, died on 29 December 1603. From Isabella, the elder daughter, descended the Youngs, baronets, of Baillieborough Castle, County Cavan, the family of John Young, Baron Lisgar.

Peter Young was educated at the Dundee Grammar School, and probably matriculated at St. Andrews University, though no record of his attendance there has been found. When he was admitted burgess of Dundee he was designated ‘Magister’, a title exclusively used by masters of arts. In 1562 he was sent to the continent to complete his studies under the care of his uncle, Henry Scrimgeour, by whom he was recommended to Theodore Beza, then professor of theology at Geneva. Scrymgeour was appointed to the newly founded chair of civil law at Geneva in 1563, and Young resided with him until in 1568 he returned to Scotland. His reputation as a scholar was so great that in the beginning of 1569–70 the regent Moray appointed him joint-instructor of the infant James VI along with George Buchanan.

As Buchanan was then advanced in years, it is probable that the chief share of teaching the infant king fell upon Young; and he is referred to in complimentary terms in Buchanan's ‘Epistolæ.’ From the account given by Sir James Melville of Halhill it appears that while Buchanan was ‘wise and sharp,’ Young was more of the courtier. This attitude won the affection of the king, and Young was his favourite counsellor up till the king's death. A relic of the education of the king is in the British Museum (Addit. MS. 34275) in 1893, in the form of a fragment of the king's books written in Young's handwriting, interspersed with exercises by the royal pupil. This manuscript was published in the ‘Miscellany’ of the Scottish History Society in 1893, with notes by George F. Warner.

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