John of Fordun

John of Fordun (died c. 1384) was a Scottish priest and chronicler. Outraged that Edward III's armies had carried off or destroyed Scotland's old records, he travelled through England and Ireland gathering material for the first continuous history of his country.

Written in Latin and divided into five books, his Chronica Gentis Scotorum traced the Scottish kings back to the legendary Fergus I and ended with David I's death in 1153.

Though its early books cannot be verified, Walter Bower later continued the work as the Scotichronicon, and Fordun remained the foundation of Scottish historiography for centuries.