8 THE LIFE AND LEGEND OF MICHAEL SCOT 



Englishman, but no one would think of quoting it 

 as of sufficient value to disprove the testimony of 

 Bacon and Bonatti who both believed Michael to 

 have been born in Scotland. If, however, there 

 should offer itself any way in which both these 

 apparently contending opinions can be reconciled, 

 we are surely bound to accept such an explanation 

 of the difficulty, and in fact the solution we are 

 about to propose not only meets the conditions of 

 the problem, but will be found to narrow very 

 considerably the limits of country within which the 

 birthplace of Scot is to be looked for. 



The See of Durham in that age, and for long 

 afterwards, had a wide sphere of influence, extending 

 over much of the south-eastern part of the Scottish 

 Borders. Many deeds relating to this region of 

 Scotland must be sought in the archives that belong 

 to the English Cathedral. To be born in the 

 territory of Durham then, as Leland says Scot had 

 been, was not necessarily to be a native of England, 

 and the anonymous Florentine commentator on 

 Dante uses a remarkable expression which seems to 

 confirm this solution as far as Scot is concerned. 

 ' This Michael,' he says, ' was of the Province of 

 Scotland';^ and his words seem to point to that 

 part of the Scottish lowlands adjacent to the See 

 of Durham and in a sense its province, as subject to 

 its influence, just as Provence, the analogous part 

 of France, had its name from the similar relation 

 it bore to Rome. The most likely opinion there- 

 fore that can now be formed on the subject leads 

 us to believe that Scot was born somewhere in the 



1 Comento alia Divina Commedia, Inf., canto xx. Bologna, Fanfeni, 

 1866-74. 



