The unique honour recognises his acclaimed anthology Rain, released this year, which was named the Forward Poetry Prize’s best collection, and also acknowledges his other works.

Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, who chaired the medal’s judging panel, said Paterson’s writings were “poetry of bravery and conviction, acutely attuned to the most intimate of human exchanges, rendered with a formal grace, a moving candour and a beguiling cadence.

“Whether writing of the joys of finding love and fatherhood or suffering the despair of losing loved ones, these poems are a witness and a guide to our most precious moments, achieving in two decades of work what few manage so well in a lifetime: an unforgettable expression of life experienced at its most heightened and most memorable.”

Distinguished past winners have included WH Auden (1936), John Betjeman (1960), Philip Larkin (1965), Stevie Smith (1969) and Ted Hughes (1974).

Patterson, a Dundee-born jazz guitarist, has won numerous honours since publishing his first collection of verse in the early 1990s.

The Forward Poetry Prize for Rain came 16 years after his first anthology, Nil Nil, won the competition’s first collection category and follows his best single poem award of last year - making the poet only the second person to win all three awards.

Among Paterson’s other works are the collections God’s Gift To Women (1997), winner of both the TS Eliot and the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prizes, The Eyes (1999), and Landing Light (2003), winner of the TS Eliot Prize and Whitbread Prize for Poetry.

The poet is a creative writing fellow in the English faculty at the University of St Andrews and was awarded an OBE in 2008.

The Gold Medal for Poetry was instituted by George V in 1933 at the suggestion of the then Poet Laureate, John Masefield.

The honour is awarded for excellence in poetry for either a body of work or an outstanding poetry collection published during the year of the award.