The Antiquary

The Antiquary is a novel by Sir Walter Scott about several characters including an antiquary: an amateur historian, archaeologist and collector of items of dubious antiquity. The book is written in the third person so the narrative does not remain with the antiquary. This is Scott's gothic novel, redolent with family secrets, stories of hidden treasure and hopeless love, with a mysterious, handsome, young man, benighted aristocracy and a night-time funeral procession to a ruined abbey. The romance and mystery is counterpoised by some of Scott's more down-to-earth characters, and grittily unromantic events. Scott wrote in an advertisement to the novel that his purpose in writing it, similar to that of his novels Waverley and Guy Mannering, was to document Scottish life and manners of a certain period, in this case the last decade of the 18th century.