Biography
Dunbar first appears in the historical record in 1474 as a new student or determinant of the Faculty of Arts at the University of St Andrews. Since the customary age for entering a Scottish university at this time was fourteen, a birth-date of 1459 or 1460 has been assumed. At Saint Andrews, he obtained a Bachelor's degree in 1477 and a Master's degree in 1479. Details from his later life suggest that he was ordained as a priest at some point, but the date is unknown.
In 1491 and 1492 Dunbar accompanied an embassy to Denmark-Norway and France in an unknown capacity. In 1501 and 1502 he paricipated in an embassy to England in the staff of Bishop Andrew Forman of Moray.
From 1500 the poet was employed at the court of James IV in a role for which he received an annual salary referred to as a pensioun. His duties are not recorded; he is referred to only as a servitour or servant; but it is to this period that the bulk of his poetry can be dated. Several of Dunbar's poems were included in the Chepman and Myllar prints of 1508, the first books to be printed in Scotland.
In 1510, his pensioun was set at the substantial annual sum of £80 Scots. In comparison, Dunbar's contemporary Hector Boece received an annual salary of £26,13s Scots for his role as Principal of King's College, Aberdeen.
The last reliable reference to Dunbar is in the Treasurer's Accounts for May 1513 where he is recorded receiving a payment of his pensioun. James IV died at Flodden in September of the same year. In the dislocation that followed, the Treasurer's accounts cease for a period and, when resumed in 1515, Dunbar is no longer recorded as being employed by the crown.
A poem, Quhen the Governour Past in France, describing the departure of the Regent Albany for France in 1517 is attributed to Dunbar in the Maitland Manuscripts, suggesting that he was still active at the time. But in David Lyndsay's work The Testament and Complaynt of the Papyngo of 1530, Dunbar is referred to as being deceased. The exact date of his death remains unknown.
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