George Adam Smith (19 October 1856 - 3 March 1942),
Scottish theologian, was born in
Calcutta, where his father, George Smith, C.I.E., was then Principal of the Doveton College, a boys' school.
He was educated at
Edinburgh in the
Royal High School, the
University of Edinburgh and the
New College. After studying for summer semesters at the
University of Tübingen (1876) and the
University of Leipzig (1878) and travelling in
Egypt and
Syria, he entered the ministry of the
Free Church of Scotland and was appointed professor of
Old Testament subjects in the
Free Church College at
Glasgow in 1892. In 1909 he was appointed principal of the
University of Aberdeen, a post he held until his retirement in 1935. He was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 1916, and was knighted in the same year. He served as Moderator of the General Assembly of the United Free Church of Scotland in 1916-17.[1] Most of his papers are held in the National Library of Scotland, in Edinburgh.