ABSTRACT
In Early Modern Scotland the Fife town of St Andrews was one of the realm's most vital and vibrant centres. The commercial role of the burgh is evident from the harbour and its trading ships and the market square with its attendant tollbooth, market cross and tron. It was that John Winram spent most of his life, coming first as a student of St Leonard's College and, having become, amongst other things, the subprior of the Augustinian priory and the Superintendent of Fife, dying within the town some 70 years later. During this period Winram immersed himself in the activities of the town's ecclesiastical, as well as its educational establishments. At an unknown date, probably during the priorship of John Hepburn (1483-1526), Winram joined the Augustinian priory. Winram's academic excellence in the college was paralleled by his rise through the ranks in the priory - from canon to subprior in only 30 months.
