THOMAS THE RHYMER, or more correctly THOMAS OF ERCELDOUNE (c.1220-c.1297). A Scottish seer and poet, about whom very little is positively known. Erceldoune (now called Earlston) was a village in Berwickshirc on the river Leader, about two miles above its junction with the Tweed. The earliest extant mention of Thomas as a seer is in the continua tion of Fordun's Scotichrouicon, attributed to Walter Bower (d. 1449). For centuries all sorts of prophecies were connected with his name. A collection of them was published at Edinburgh in 1603 under the title The Whole Proplicsie of Scotland. To Thomas the Rhymer has been attributed a beautiful fairy story in verse. According to the legend, Thomas was wont to meet a. 'lady fair' on Huntly Banks near Eildon Tree. By her lie was conveyed to fairy land, where lie acquired the knowledge that made him famed. After living there for a period, he was permitted to go 'to the earth to practice his prophetic skill, on the condition that he should come back at the fairy's bidding. One day, while he was making merry with his friends, the sum mons came. He instantly arose. and disappeared
in the forest never to be seen again on earth. lluntly Bank and the neighboring lands became a part of Abbotsford. The poem, consisting of the minstrel's usual prologue and three fyttes, con tains 700 lines. It exists in four complete manu scripts, of which the oldest is the Thornton at Cambridge (assigned to 1430-40). Though they are all in English, they point to an older origi nal, which may have been the composition of Thomas. Sir Walter Scott and others also as cribed to Thomas the verse romance of Sir Trig trem. It exists in a single manuscript in the Advocates' Library at Edinburgh. It seems to have been copied from a northern original by a southern scribe about 1450. Though the poem contains allusions to Thomas of Erceldoune, his authorship is now questioned. Consult: The Romance and Prophecies of Thomas of Ercel doune, ed. by J. A. H. Murray for the "Early English Text Society" (London, 1875) ; Thomas of Erceldoune, ed. by Brandl (Berlin, 1880).