author
Robert Kirk
d. 1692
A Scottish minister and Gaelic scholar, remembered for one of the most famous books of fairy lore in the Highlands. His writing blends folklore, belief, and close observation in a way that still feels vivid centuries later.
1 Audiobook
The secret commonwealth of elves, fauns & fairies
by Robert Kirk
About the author
Born in 1644, Robert Kirk was a Church of Scotland minister, Gaelic scholar, and folklorist. He served in Balquhidder and later at Aberfoyle, and he is best known for The Secret Commonwealth, his account of fairies, second sight, ghosts, and other supernatural beliefs in the Scottish Highlands.
Kirk also played an important part in Gaelic literary culture. He produced a Gaelic translation of the Psalms and worked in a period when ministers and scholars were helping preserve and shape written Scottish Gaelic. That mix of religious learning and local tradition gives his work its distinctive voice.
He died in 1692, but stories around him only grew after his death. Local tradition in Aberfoyle claimed he had been taken by the fairies on Doon Hill, a legend that helped turn him into a figure of folklore as well as a recorder of it.