3 - Men of Law and Legal Networks in Aberdeen, Principally in 1600–1650

Summary

This chapter examines the networks and connections within the early modern legal community of Aberdeen, Scotland. It reconstructs a particular master-apprentice network of the early-seventeenth to the mid-eighteenth centuries, showing the importance of this educational mechanism both for entrance into the local legal profession and for establishing professional contacts. This chapter also reconstructs the networks which were focused on two of Aberdeen’s most important courts of the period—the sheriff and commissary courts. It shows the extent to which the men who held offices in these courts were interconnected, both personally and professionally, and reflects on what this discovery reveals about contemporaneous local court practice. Finally, this chapter concludes by reflecting on how men of law may have regarded their own networks, through an examination of their children’s god-parentage records.