Old Photograph Doctor John Leyden Cottage Denholm Scotland

Old photograph of the thatched cottage in which Doctor John Leyden was born in Denholm, located between Jedburgh and Hawick, Scotland. Tour Scottish Borders. John Leyden, born 8 September 1775, died 28 August 1811, was a Scottish orientalist. He was born in Denholm on the River Teviot. His father, a shepherd, had contrived to send him to Edinburgh University to study for the ministry. He was a diligent but somewhat haphazard student, apparently reading everything except theology, for which he seems to have had no taste. Though he completed his divinity course, and in 1798 was licensed to preach from the presbytery of St Andrews, Fife, it soon became clear that the pulpit was not his vocation. In 1803, he sailed for Madras, and took his place in the general hospital there. He was promoted to be naturalist to the commissioners going to survey Mysore, and in 1807, his knowledge of the languages of India procured him an appointment as professor of Hindustani at Calcutta; this he soon after resigned for a judgeship, and that again to be a commissioner in the court of requests in 1805, a post which required a familiarity with several Eastern languages. In 1811, Leyden joined Lord Minto in the expedition to Java. Having entered a library which was said to contain many Eastern manuscripts, without having the place aired, he was seized with Batavian fever, possibly malaria or dengue, and died, after three days' illness, on 28 August 1811. He was buried on the island, underneath a small firefly colony, which remains as his tombstone to this day.



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