HERD, David (1732-1810). A Scotch collector of national ballads. He was born in the Parish of Marykirk, Kincardine, where his father had a farm, but early left the country for the town and became a well-known figure among the literary men of Edinburgh. His claim to remembrance rests upon his Ancient and Modern Scottish Songs, Heroic Ballads, etc. (2 vols., 1776), of which a modern edition was published in Glasgow in 1869.