ABERDEEN, DIOCESIS of. — Situated in Scotland (Great Britain), it is suffragan to Saint Andrews and Edinburgh and comprises northern Scotland, the Orkney and Shetland Islands. The see is said to have been founded at Mortlach in Banffshire in 1063, or rather in 1004, according to a tradition without foundation, by the king of Scotland Malcolm II to celebrate the victory obtained over the Danes. But from about 1125 the bishop’s see has been located at A., today the most important city in northern Scotland, with 170,000 inhabitants, and capital of the county of the same name (5,015 sq. km and 300,000 inhabitants). In 1272 construction was begun on the cathedral of S. Macario, completed only in the 16th century; despite damage sustained in that same century and thereafter, considerable parts of it still exist, now used for worship by the Presbyterians. The diocese continued to exist until 1577, when the last Catholic bishop, Guglielmo Gordon, died. In the 19th century, especially after 1826, new churches were built there; on 4 March 1878 the diocese was re-established: it now has approximately 150,000 Catholics, with 50 secular priests and 40 parishes. Near A., at Blairs, stands the college of S. Maria (since 1829), the regional seminary of Scotland. At Fort Augustus there is a Benedictine abbey (1878).
1907, pp. 41-42; A. Taylor, s. V. in DHG, I, cols. 108-109; The Encyclopaedia Britannica, I, 13th ed., Londra-Nuova York 1926, col. 48; Universal Knowledge. Dictionary and Encyclopaedia, I, Nuova York 1927, pp. 47-50; Official Catholic Directory, Nuova York 1940. Cesario van Hulst
THE UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN. — It is the third in Scotland, after St. Andrews and Glasgow. It owes its existence to Bishop William Elphinstone (1483–1514), who was educated at the Universities of Glasgow, Paris, and Orléans. On behalf of King James IV, he requested from the Pope a bull of foundation, which Alexander VI granted on 24 February 1494 (Fasti Aberdoneses, ed. C. Innes [Spalding Club], Aberdeen 1854, p. 6); the bull, however, was published only in 1496 or 1497.
Elphinstone seems to have been the inspiration behind The Scot Act of 1496, which required nobles and freeholders to educate their sons in the liberal arts and law. In 1497 the bishop also obtained the royal charter (royal patent), by which he secured for the new university certain ecclesiastical revenues and the privileges enjoyed by the Universities of Paris, St. Andrews, and Glasgow.
That of A. may be regarded as the last medieval university. In its teaching it gave extensive development to philosophy and law, in which field it later became particularly renowned. Its first principal, in 1500, was the Scottish historian Hector Boece (Boyce), formerly professor of philosophy in Paris, who was the first to bring the ideas of the French Renaissance to Scotland.
The university had its seat, in Old A., in the College of Holy Virgin in Nativity, later called King's College, and was also provided with a hospital institution. The military victory of the Reformation halted its development for some time. A Protestant “new foundation” took place in 1560. In 1593 George Keith, fifth Earl Marischal of Scotland, founded, in new A., a second university, Marischal College, to which he assigned the ancient buildings of the suppressed religious orders: Black (the Black Friars, or Dominicans), Grey (the Grey Friars, or Franciscans), and White Friars (the White Friars, or Carmelites).
The two universities were united for a certain period (from 1640 to the Restoration), and a plan for permanent union was proposed in the eighteenth century; but their definitive merger took place only in 1859, after strong local opposition.