He was born in Peeblesshire and educated at St Andrews and Oxford, where he graduated in natural science, with a view to following the medical profession, which he abandoned in favour of a scholastic career. From 1883 to 1901 he was headmaster of Westminster School; and his death deprived classical scholarship in the UK of one of its most brilliant modern representatives.
Rutherford devoted special attention, to Attic Greek idioms and the language of Aristophanes. His most important work, the New Phrynichus (1882), dealing with the Atticisms of the grammarian, was supplemented by his Babrius (1883), a specimen of the later Greek language, which was the chief subject of CA Lobeck's earlier commentary (1820) on Phrynichus. His edition (1896-1905) of the Aristophanic scholia from the Ravenna manuscript was less successful.
Mention may also be made of his Elementary Greek Accidence and Lex Rex, a list of cognate words in Greek, Latin and English.
This entry was originally from the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.