CRAIG, SIR THOMAS (c. 1538-1608), Scottish jurist and poet, was born about 1538, a member of the Craigfintray family. He was educated at St. Andrews, where he took the B.A. degree in 1555. From St. Andrews he went to France, to study the canon and the civil law. He returned to Scotland about 1561, and was admitted advocate in Feb. 1563. In 1564 he was appointed jus tice-depute by the justice-general, Archibald, earl of Argyll; in he was appointed sheriff-depute of Edinburgh, and in 16o6 procurator for the church. In 1604 he came to London on the commission regarding the union of the two kingdoms. It is said that he wished to refuse the knighthood the king desired to give him, but he has always been styled and reputed a knight. His eldest son, Sir Lewis Craig 0569-2622), was raised to the bench in 1604. Sir Thomas died on Feb. 26, 1608.
Except his poems, the only one of Craig's works which ap peared during his lifetime was his Ins feudale (1603; ed. R. Bur net, 1655; Leipzig, 1716; ed. J. Baillie 1732). The object of this treatise was to assimilate the laws of England and Scotland, but, instead of this, it was an important factor in building up the law of Scotland into a separate system. Other works were De unione regnorum Britanniae tractatus, De iure successions regni Angliae and De hominio disputatio. Translations of the last two have been published, and in 1910 an edition of the De Unione appeared, with translation and notes by C. S. Terry. Craig's first poem, an Epithalamium in honour of the marriage of Mary, queen of Scots, and Darnley, appeared in 1565. Most of his poems have been reprinted in the Delitiae poetarum Scotorum.
See P. F. Tytler, Life of Craig (1823) ; Life prefixed to Baillie's edition of the Jus feudale.