1785 in Scotland
# 1785 in Scotland

Events from the year 1785 in Scotland.

## Incumbents

### Law officers

* Lord Advocate – Ilay Campbell
* Solicitor General for Scotland – Robert Dundas of Arniston

### Judiciary

* Lord President of the Court of Session – Lord Arniston, the younger
* Lord Justice General – The Viscount Stormont
* Lord Justice Clerk – Lord Barskimming

## Events

* 7 March – geologist James Hutton proposes the theory of uniformitarianism to the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
* Late September – James Boswell’s The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides is published.
* 5 October – flight by Florentine aeronaut Vincenzo Lunardi in a gas balloon from George Heriot's School, Edinburgh, across the Firth of Forth to Ceres, Fife (32 mi (51.5 km) in 1.5 hrs).
* 23 November – Lunardi flies from St Andrew's Square, Glasgow, to Hawick.

## Births

* 18 May – John Wilson, writer (died 1854)
* 18 November – David Wilkie, painter (died at sea 1841)

## Deaths

* 23 January – Matthew Stewart, mathematician (born 1717)
* 4 October – Alexander Runciman, painter (born 1736)
* 23 October – William Cochran, painter (born 1738)

## The arts

* 22 May – Robert Burns' first child, Elizabeth ("Dear-bought Bess"), is born to his mother's servant, Elizabeth Paton and his poems "To a Mouse" and "Halloween" are written.
* Scotland portal
