"Scientific Whigs"? Scottish historians on the French Revolution

Plassart, Anna (2013). "Scientific Whigs"? Scottish historians on the French Revolution. Journal of the History of Ideas, 74(1) pp. 93–114.

Abstract

The Scottish reception of the French Revolution has usually been considered from the point of view of its influence on the so-called “Burke-Paine” debate. This article examines the impact of the French Revolution in Scotland from a different perspective, by focusing on the writings of the so-called “Scottish historians.” It examines the pre-1789 Scottish narratives of European constitutional history, and argues that the historical thought of Hume, Smith, Robertson, and Millar was misappropriated in the 1790s, as their writings were wrongly used to underpin a “social” interpretation of the fall of the French monarchy.

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• Item ORO ID
• 42071
• Item Type
• Journal Item
• ISSN
• 0022-5037
• Extra Information
• All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations used for purposes of scholarly citation, none of this work may be reproduced in any form by any means without written permission from the publisher. For information address the University of Pennsylvania Press, 3905 Spruce Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-4112.
• Academic Unit or School
• Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) > Arts and Humanities > History
  Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS) > Arts and Humanities
  Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences (FASS)
• Copyright Holders
• © 2013 University of Pennsylvania Press
• Depositing User
• Anna Plassart