Historical Introductions to the WS Society Histories 1890, 1936, 1983

The Upper Hall of the Signet Library set up for a UK Government Commission on Scotland in 1948.

In 1890 the WS Society published the first full-scale History of the Society of Writers to His Majesty’s Signet. The volume was in three main parts: a general history of the Society (and its Library) from the earliest times; a Register of all known members; and a series of significant extracts from the Sederunt (Minute) Books of the Society from the first entry of 1594 up until 1887. A new History was published in 1936 which continued the general history, published a corrected and expanded Register of Members, and continued the Sederunt Book extracts up to 1935 along with extracts from the parallel Commissioners’ Minute Book which opened in 1820.

Below we reproduce these general histories. They are best viewed at full screen in a desktop environment.