‘Brilliant’ university history don leaves a £1m fortune
A RENOWNED academic famed for his work on Scottish history has left a £1million fortune.
Dr Nicholas Phillipson spent more than five decades researching and studying the 18th century.
He was a widely acknowledged expert on the Scottish Enlightenment, a period spanning the 18th and early 19th century and defined by an outpouring of intellectual and scientific accomplishment.
He wrote and contributed to a number of books, many of which have become classics of historical scholarship.
Dr Phillipson had been a senior lecturer at Edinburgh University before retiring in 2004 after 39 years. But following a short battle with illness, he died in January, aged 80. His published will shows he built up a £1,078,460.71 fortune which he left to his family.
He left many paintings to friends and gifted a portrait of English historian Sir Steven Runciman to Glasgow University’s Hunterian Gallery.
He also gifted £50,000 to the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain.
Dr Thomas Ahnert, head of history at Edinburgh University, earlier paid tribute to his colleague and his ‘distinguished career’.
He said: ‘Nick was a brilliant teacher to several generations of undergraduates and graduate students, and an inspiring and generous mentor to many younger colleagues. He will be greatly missed by many in the department and beyond.’
At the time of his death Dr Phillipson had been writing a major work on the Scottish Enlightenment.
‘Distinguished career’