User:Andrew Gray/Drafts/Stair

The institutions of the law of Scotland was a 1681 work by James Dalrymple, 1st Viscount of Stair, which provided an overview of Scottish law.

Impact
The work was the inspiration for the Stair Memorial Encyclopedia, a project which was formed to commemorate the tercentenary of its publication. The first volume was published in 1986, and the 25th and final volume ten years later. It is continually updated, and serves today as the major reference work on Scots law.

Publication history
A revised edition was published in 1983, edited by David M. Walker. This was drawn heavily from the second edition of 1693, with a thorough modern referencing for all cases cited. However, the new edition was criticised strongly by Professor Alan Watson, who felt that a modern version of the first edition would have been substantially more useful from a historical perspective.