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Forteviot, Palace of Kings
Although there is little evidence of it today, the tiny village of Forteviot with its population of around 200 was once the centre of the Pictish and newly-emerging Scottish kingdoms in the 9th century. Around 15 miles south-west of Perth, and situated in the Strathearn valley, close to the River Earn, we first heard of Continue reading
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Vikings in Black and White
At the end of my last post I noted that in the mid-800s, as well as fighting the Irish, we now had Vikings attacking Vikings and that the narrative was in danger of becoming even more confusing. Fortunately the annalists seem to have come up with a way of distinguishing the established vikings from the Continue reading
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Tomrair, a Viking Jarl in Ireland
In Turges – a Norse leader in Ireland, we saw how the Irish prince – and then king – of Mide, Mael Sechnaill, had ritually drowned the Norse leader Turges in 845 – a result of the ongoing conflict in Ireland between the various groups and tribes. Mael had become king (and later would be Continue reading
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Turges – a Norse leader in Ireland
A name which appears in the Irish Annals between 839 and 845 is Turges (or Turgeis, Tuirgheis or Turgesius), a Norse chieftain fighting in Ireland. This post will look at this character – and what he represented – but first it might be helpful to remind ourselves of what was happening in Ireland at that Continue reading
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Arrival of the Norwegians: Early Kings and The Family of Ketil Flatnose
In this post I want to turn once again towards Scandinavia. In the early 9th century the land now called Norway was not united. Instead there existed a number of kingdoms such as Vestfold, Rogaland, Romsdal and Sogn. Just as we have seen Kenneth MacAlpin being linked with the uniting of different realms into a Continue reading
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Kenneth MacAlpin Part III – a modern interpretation
In the last two blog posts (The Last Pictish Kings: Part 2 – Kenneth, Brude, Drust… and Kenneth and Kenneth MacAlpin Part II ) I looked at the story of Kenneth MacAlpin, the man who is often described as the first king of the Scots. The earlier sources call him king of the Picts, but Continue reading
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Kenneth MacAlpin Part II
In The Last Pictish Kings: Part 2 – Kenneth, Brude, Drust… and Kenneth, I posed the question: was Kenneth MacAlpin a Gael or a Pict? I was grateful to receive a number of comments and suggestion in various social media groups where I shared the link to the blog, and it confirmed my suspicion that Continue reading
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The Last Pictish Kings: Part 2 – Kenneth, Brude, Drust… and Kenneth
In the last post we saw how, after the catastrophic defeat by the Norse in 839 which impacted both the Picts and the Dál Riadan Scots, Uurad ruled in Pictland for three years, and was based in Perthshire. His son, Bred, then ruled for one year. For those who followed, the truth becomes murkier, not Continue reading
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The Last Pictish Kings: Part 1 – Uurad and Bred
In Vikings v Picts, Scots, Irish and Anglo-Saxons, I wrote that a battle in 839 between the Picts & Scots on one side, and the Norse on the other, resulted in the deaths of the Pictish king Uuen (sometimes referred to as Wen or Eóganán) and his brother Bran, and also that of Áed mac Continue reading
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Who were the Picts? – Views from abroad
As there are no original Pictish literary sources surviving[1] – or at least, none which have yet been discovered – the portrayal of the Pictish people which has been passed down the centuries comes from others. This inevitably means that any such portrait will have an element of bias. Stories of the Picts were sometimes Continue reading
The Northern Tapestry
Exploring the sagas and stories that link medieval Iceland, Scandinavia and the northern British Isles
Ortelius Map reproduced with permission from Vintage Maps
The Northern Tapestry 