[MR] History Blog: Largest Pictish Settlement Ever

[Garth Groff and Sally Sanford]

Noble Friends, Especially Fellow Scots,

Yesterday it was a choice between this story and "The Nightwatch". The
painting won. The Tap O'Noth Pictish site has been waiting for over 1,500
years, so a day doesn't make much difference.

Ongoing excavations at a hill known near Rhynie in northeast Scotland have
revealed that this 5th-6th century hill fort was huge. Remains of over 800
family dwellings have been identified. Allowing an average of five people
per family, that suggests a population of around 4,000. This is the largest
Pictish settlement yet identified, and wasn't matched in Medieval Scotland
until the 12th century.

Besides the mundane remains from these dwellings, the site has coughed up
eight carved Pictish "stanes" (that's "stones" to us), along with
Mediterranean amphora, French glassware, and traces of wine from the
Mediterranean region (not from France?; tsk, tsk), suggesting that the
settlement was a high status community, possibly the seat of a chief or
king.

The whole story is at http://www.thehistoryblog.com/archives/58659 .

Another story with more photos is at the Ancient Origins web site:
https://www.ancient-origins.net/news-history-archaeology/pictish-settlement-0013712

The NOSAS Archaeology Blog also has an extensive page on the Tap O'Noth
dig, with diagrams of the fort's layout:
https://nosasblog.wordpress.com/2016/05/06/craig-phadrig-vitrified-hillfort-inverness/
.

Yours Aye,


Mungo Napier, Laird of Mallard Lodge  🦆