Picts

These works relate events of previous centuries, but current scholarship recognises their often allegorical, pseudo-historical nature, and their true value often lies in an appraisal of the time period in which they were written.

[6] The difficulties with Pictish history and archaeology arise from the fact that the people who were called Picts were a fundamentally heterogeneous group with little cultural uniformity.

Care is needed to avoid viewing them through the lens of what the cultural historian Gilbert Márkus calls the "Ethnic Fallacy".

[7] The people known as "Picts" by outsiders in late antiquity were very different from those who later adopted the name, in terms of language, culture, religion and politics.

The term "Pict" is found in Roman sources from the end of the third century AD, when it was used to describe unromanised people in northern Britain.

Fraser posits that it was only adopted as an endonym in the late seventh century, as an inclusive term for people under rule of the Verturian hegemony, centered in Fortriu (the area around modern-day Inverness and Moray), particularly following the Battle of Dun Nechtain.

Gordon Noble and Nicholas Evans consider it plausible, if not provable, that "Picts" may have been used as an endonym by those northern Britons in closest contact with Rome as early as the fourth century.

The use of "Picts" as a descriptive term continued to the formation of the Alpínid dynasty in the ninth century, and the merging of the Pictish Kingdom with that of Dál Riata.

[22] It has been proposed that the Picts may have called themselves Albidosi, a name found in the Chronicle of the Kings of Alba during the reign of Máel Coluim mac Domnaill.

[23] The origin myth presented in Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People describes the Picts as settlers from Scythia who arrived on the northern coast of Ireland by chance.

[27] Its structure is similar to the origin myths of other peoples and its main purpose appears to have been to legitimise the annexation of Pictish territories by Fortriu and the creation of a wider Pictland.

[28] A study published in 2023 sequenced the whole genomes from eight individuals associated with the Pictish period, excavated from cemeteries at Lundin Links in Fife and Balintore, Easter Ross.

[32] The Picts were probably tributary to Northumbria until the reign of Bridei mac Beli, when, in 685, the Anglians suffered a defeat at the Battle of Dun Nechtain that halted their northward expansion.

However, though the Pictish language did not disappear suddenly, a process of Gaelicisation (which may have begun generations earlier) was clearly underway during the reigns of Caustantín and his successors.

[45] De Situ Albanie is not the most reliable of sources, and the number of kingdoms, one for each of the seven sons of Cruithne, the eponymous founder of the Picts, may well be grounds enough for disbelief.

The only woman ruler, mentioned in early Scottish history, is the Pictish Queen in 617, who summoned pirates to massacre Donnán and his companions on the island of Eigg.

In much the same period, the Picts' neighbours in Dál Riata and Northumbria faced considerable difficulties, as the stability of succession and rule that previously benefited them ended.

[56] The archaeological record gives insight into the Picts' material culture, and suggest a society not readily distinguishable from its British, Gaelic, or Anglo-Saxon neighbours.

[citation needed] Like most northern European people in Late Antiquity, the Picts were farmers living in small communities.

Vegetables included kale, cabbage, onions and leeks, peas and beans and turnips, and some types no longer common, such as skirret.

There is only limited evidence of long-distance trade with Pictland, but tableware and storage vessels from Gaul, probably transported up the Irish Sea, have been found.

Naturalistic depictions of Pictish nobles, hunters and warriors, male and female, without obvious tattoos, are found on monumental stones.

[69] Early Pictish religion is presumed to have resembled Celtic polytheism in general, although only place names remain from the pre-Christian era.

[72] Recent archaeological work at Portmahomack places the foundation of the monastery there, an area once assumed to be among the last converted, in the late 6th century.

In areas that have been studied, such as Strathspey and Perthshire, it appears that the parochial structure of the High Middle Ages existed in early medieval times.

The symbols and patterns consist of animals including the Pictish Beast, the "rectangle", the "mirror and comb", "double-disc and Z-rod" and the "crescent and V-rod", among many others.

The cross-slabs are carved with Pictish symbols, Insular-derived interlace and Christian imagery, though interpretation is often difficult due to wear and obscurity.

A famous 7th century silver and enamel plaque from the hoard has a "Z-rod", one of the Pictish symbols, in a particularly well-preserved and elegant form; unfortunately few comparable pieces have survived.

Pictish iconography shows books being read and carried, and its naturalistic style gives every reason to suppose that such images were of real life.

These were argued by influential linguist Kenneth Jackson to be unintelligible as Celtic and evidence for the coexistence of a non-Celtic language in Pictish times.