Table Of ContentPictish Progress
The Northern World
North Europe and the Baltic c. 400–1700 A.D.
Peoples, Economies and Cultures
Editors
Barbara Crawford (St Andrews)
David Kirby (London)
Jon-Vidar Sigurdsson (Oslo)
Ingvild Øye (Bergen)
Richard W. Unger (Vancouver)
Piotr Gorecki (University of California at Riverside)
VOLUME 50
Pictish Progress
New Studies on Northern Britain in the Early Middle Ages
Edited by
Stephen T. Driscoll, Jane Geddes and Mark A. Hall
LEIDEN • BOSTON
2011
Cover illustration: Barry Grove at Hilton of Cadboll
©Photography by GUARD, University of Glasgow, 2001
The Authors wish to acknowledge with gratitude publication awards from The
Strathmartine Trust, Sandeman Fund; The Hunter Archaeological Trust; Aberdeen
University; and The Hunter Marshall Trust, Glasgow University.
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Pictish progress : new studies on northern Britain in the Middle Ages / edited by
Stephen T. Driscoll, Jane Geddes, and Mark A. Hall.
p. cm. — (The northern world ; v. 50)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-90-04-18759-7 (hardback : acid-free paper) 1. Picts. 2. Scotland—
History—To 1057. 3. Art, Pictish—Scotland. 4. Archaeology, Medieval—Scotland.
5. Scotland—Antiquities. 6. Picts—Historiography. I. Driscoll, Stephen T. II. Geddes,
J. (Jane) III. Hall, Mark A. (Mark Anthony), 1962– IV. Title. V. Series.
DA774.P526 2010
941.101—dc22
2010030372
ISSN 1569-1462
ISBN 978 90 04 18759 7
Copyright 2011 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing,
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CONTENTS
Foreword ............................................................................................. vii
Stephen T. Driscoll, Jane Geddes and Mark A. Hall
List of Contributors ............................................................................ xi
List of Figures ..................................................................................... xiii
List of Tables ....................................................................................... xvii
Maps: 1.1: A cultural geography of northern Britain in the
seventh century .............................................................. xix
1.2: Places mentioned in the text ....................................... xx
INTRODUCTION
F. T. Wainwright and The Problem of the Picts ................................ 3
Barbara E. Crawford
PART ONE
NAMES AND TEXTS
From Ancient Scythia to The Problem of the Picts: Thoughts on
the Quest for Pictish Origins ........................................................ 15
James E. Fraser
Ideology, Literacy and Matriliny: Approaches to Medieval Texts
on the Pictish Past .......................................................................... 45
Nicholas Evans
Pictish Place-names Revisited .......................................................... 67
Simon Taylor
PART TWO
STORIES IN STONE
The Problems of Pictish Art, 1955–2009 ......................................... 121
Jane Geddes
vi contents
Tales from Beyond the Pict: Sculpture and its Uses in and around
Forteviot, Perthshire from the Ninth Century Onwards .......... 135
Mark A. Hall
Saints, Scrolls and Serpents: Theorising a Pictish Liturgy on the
Tarbat Peninsula ............................................................................. 169
Kellie Meyer
The Forms of Two Crosses on Pictish Cross-slabs: Rossie Priory,
Perthshire and Glamis no. 2 ......................................................... 201
Robert D. Stevick
The Interpretation of Non-ferrous Metalworking in Early
Historic Scotland ........................................................................... 221
Andrew Heald
PART THREE
LANDSCAPES FOR THE LIVING AND THE DEAD
Pictish Archaeology: Persistent Problems and Structural
Solutions .......................................................................................... 245
Stephen T. Driscoll
Together as One: The Landscape of the Symbol Stones at Rhynie,
Aberdeenshire ................................................................................ 281
Meggen Gondek and Gordon Noble
The Early Medieval Landscape of Donside, Aberdeenshire ......... 307
Iain Fraser and Stratford Halliday
A Review of Pictish Burial Practices in Tayside and Fife .............. 335
Sarah Winlow
Index .................................................................................................... 371
FOREWORD
THE ROAD TO PUBLICATION
This publication is the culmination of an extended programme of con-
ferences that have sought to mark the contribution of F. T. Wainwright
to Pictish studies, and in particular the 50th anniversary of The Problem
of the Picts. The latter book, which Wainwright edited and contributed
to, started life as a conference, the first Scottish Summer School in
Archaeology, held in Dundee in 1952, and appeared as a book in 1955.
Our somewhat more extended chronology has taken us from 2004
(and the first of four conferences that marked the 50th anniversary)
until the appearance of this book in 2010. The programmes of all four
conferences are listed below in order to give due acknowledgement
and thanks to all those who contributed to their success, regardless of
the inevitable selection process to reduce the papers down to a man-
ageable and representative size for publication (with some of those not
published here published, or set to be published, elsewhere).
The 2004 conference in Perth was organised by Mark Hall on behalf
of the co-sponsors, Tayside and Fife Archaeological Committee and
Perth Museum and Art Gallery. The 2006 conferences in Kalamazoo
and Leeds (with sponsorship from Brill’s Northern World book series)
were driven by the immense energy and enthusiasm of the late Dave
Edsall (Iowa State University), who organised the Kalamazoo session
and brought Stephen Driscoll and Mark Hall on board to help organ-
ise the session in Leeds. Sadly, Dave passed away before he could see
this fruit which owes so much to his passionate labouring. We dedi-
cate this volume to his memory. The Aberdeen conference, also 2006,
was organised by Jane Geddes on behalf of the Society of Antiquaries
of Scotland and the Aberdeen University Research Institute of Irish
and Scottish Studies. It finally brought the research to an audience in
northern Pictland.
In addition, we are indebted to Barbara Crawford for supplying the
insightful academic biography of Wainwright, and to James Fraser,
whose contribution was solicited by the editors after its presentation
to a meeting of the First Millennia Studies Group in Edinburgh in
2007. This was particularly gratifying as not only is Fraser’s paper on
a theme Wainwright would have found fascinating but Fraser had
viii foreword
initiated a commemorative Wainwright project in 2003 but was forced
to abandon it for personal reasons.
The conference programmes:
1. Fifty Years On from Wainwright: Are the Picts the Problem? Perth
Museum and Art Gallery, Perth, Scotland, 20 March 2004
• Simon Taylor: How Pictish are our Place-names?
• Meggen Gondek: Questions for the Pictish Monumental
Landscape
• John Barrett: From Pattern to Process: The Implications of
Excavations at Pitcarmick
• Derek Hall and Mark A. Hall: What’s Cooking? New Carbon
Dates for the Earliest Phases of the Perth High Street Excavation
and the Question of Perth’s Early Medieval Origin
• Martin Carver: Portmahomack and the ‘conversion’ of the Picts
• Stephen T. Driscoll: The Problem with Pictish Archaeology: A
Southern Perspective
• Sarah Winlow: Burial in the First Millennium AD: Pagan and
Christian in Tayside and Beyond
2. Fresh Pict: Fifty Years of Pictish Studies, Kalamazoo International
Medieval Congress, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo,
Michigan, USA, 5 May 2006
• Michael D. King: The Christian Meaning of the Pictish Crescent
and the V-Rod Symbol
• Kellie Meyer: Saints, Scrolls and Serpents: Theorising a Pictish
Liturgy
• Robert D. Stevick: Pictish Participation in Insular Art: The Forms
of the Crosses on Two Cross-slabs
• Helen McKay: The Spoked Wheel Symbol of Pictland
• Kelley K. McDonald: Pictish Symbol Reversal: A Way to
Distinguish between the Living and the Dead
• Kirsten J. Anderson: Monumental Hegemony: Brochs and Pictish
Symbol Stones in Early Medieval North Scotland
• Jean Hetzel: The Bonny Wee Symbols: An Examination of Pictish
Symbols on Small Artefacts
• Lloyd Laing: How Roman were the Celts?
foreword ix
3. Fresh Pict: Fifty Years of Pictish Studies, Leeds International Medieval
Congress, Leeds University, Leeds, England, 12 July 2006
• Stephen T. Driscoll: Problems with Pictish Archaeology: A
Southern Perspective
• Sally Foster: The Joys, Pitfalls and Lessons of Attempting to
Reconstruct the Biography of a Major Pictish monument: The
Hilton of Cadboll Cross-slab, Easter Ross
• Jane Geddes: The Problems of Pictish Art: Fifty Years On
• Martin Carver: The Early Monastery at Portmahomack and its
Context
• Meggen Gondek: Standing on Pictish Ceremony: The Landscape
of Symbol Stones at Rhynie, Aberdeenshire
• Allie Nickel: From Apurfeirt to Athan: Abernethy as a Pictish
Centre
• Lloyd Laing: Workshops and Pictish Patronage in the Ninth and
Tenth Centuries
• Mark A. Hall: Dupplin and Invermay, Crosses and their Landscapes:
More on the Cultural Biography of Pictish Sculpture
• Nicholas Evans: Ideology, Literacy and Matriliny: Approaches to
Medieval Texts on the Pictish Past
• Andrew Heald: The Role of the Smith in Religious and Secular
Early Medieval Society: Metalworking Workshops at Tarbat,
Easter Ross
• Margaret Duszejko-Studenna: Music and Language of the Art
within Art: Deceptive Ornament on Christian Monuments—
Decoding the Structures
4. Fresh Pict: Problems Revisited in Aberdeen, Aberdeen University,
Aberdeen, Scotland, 18 November, 2006
• Nicholas Evans: Ideology, Literacy and Matriliny
• David Dumville: Matriliny
• Lloyd Laing: Workshops and Patronage
• Andrew Heald: The Role of the Smith
• Simon Taylor: Pictish Place-names Revisited
• Stratford Halliday: The Pictish Landscape of Donside
• Gordon Noble: The Ground Beneath his Feet: The Landscape
Context of Rhynie Man
• Jane Geddes: St Vigean, St Fechin and St Antony: A Lost Cycle
in Southern Pictland?
