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Post by Deleted on Sept 13, 2019 15:27:55 GMT -5
Slavs didn't leave anything written behind either, until they were Christianised and the need for church service in the local language arised. Before that they had centuries to adopt writing from the Byzantines or the Germans but they didn't, as far as we know. Their pagan temples were completely destroyed, a lot of them in a way all too similar to what the Spanish did in America. So who knows, right? Might be a stupid question, but I don't know much about the Picts. Did they adopt Christianity and who Christianised them? What were their important centres and did they get disrupted by outsiders? They did adopt Christianity, but it was a slow process which would have continued over a couple of hundred years and probably not been completed by the time the Picts had ceased to be. As usual we are reliant on Ecclesiastical sources for our info with all the inherent bias that accompany them. Now when it comes to hagiographies and their emphasis on the miracles performed by their subject, Abbott Adomnan of Iona's 'Vita of Columba' can only be described as an eighth century blockbuster of epic proportions. It relates the tale of how in the sixth century Columba travelled up Loch Ness into the heart of darkness to convert the Pictish King Brude in his stronghold somewhere near Inverness. On his way he vanquishes the Loch Ness Monster, the first ever mention of the beast in literature, miraculously shatters the iron locks of the stronghold gate and out miracles Brude's pagan priest in a show of Christian superiority. Impressive stuff, but the truth is probably much more mundane as it is unlikely Brude would have met Columba without some diplomatic groundwork probably laid by a Gaelic King of Dalriada. For all Columba's efforts in converting the Northern Picts there is not one single place in the area which commemorates him while there are a plethora of place names which honour Irish missionaries such as Tiernan, Brigid and Mochair. Make of it what you will, but the truth is the Northern Picts were probably converted by many Irish monks, while their Southern counterparts were Christianised by Northumbrian Clerics as related by Bede. It seems Columba got the kudos as he had a first rate PR man in Adomnan. I hope that goes some way to addressing your questions. |
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Post by Earl of Rochester on Sept 13, 2019 15:57:14 GMT -5
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Post by Deleted on Sept 13, 2019 16:40:08 GMT -5
I think it is fairly safe to say the hunter gatherers were long gone by the time the Picts first emerged into the light of history Earl, but that is not to say a few individuals who lived in the more remote areas of Pictland away from the gaze of the elite may have continued in the old ways. The Pictish landholding system seems to have been well organised judging by the number of place names with the prefix Pit which means share such as Pitmedden, Pittenweem, Pitfodels and so on. Some historians have even gone as far as to label the landholdings as Farmer Republics, but I do not buy into that as the Elite would have probably have retained a degree of control. The warlords would probably have distributed slaves from their raids among the farmers in return for a regular supply of produce and cattle which would have maintained their lavish lifestyles. The giving and receiving of gifts was an important feature of Pictish culture, but the farmers did not take part in warfare which was an aristocratic pursuit. Hope that helps I have not watched your video yet which probably contradicts most of what I have said LOL. |
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Post by Earl of Rochester on Sept 13, 2019 17:24:05 GMT -5
It's an In Our Time radio 4 programs so good bedtime listening. The Highlands are rather a savage landscape, it does make one wonder how they survived. Perhaps most were lowland? What sort of farming would they have done? I mention hunters as I imagine the terrain would be hard to farm.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 13, 2019 17:53:24 GMT -5
It's an In Our Time radio 4 programs so good bedtime listening. The Highlands are rather a savage landscape, it does make one wonder how they survived. Perhaps most were lowland? What sort of farming would they have done? I mention hunters as I imagine the terrain would be hard to farm. Most of the Pictish lands were in the lowland East coast of Scotland which was generally well suited to agriculture and by the time of the Picts most of the land had been farmed for hundreds of years. Archaeology has uncovered huge barn like structures from the late Neolithic and Bronze Age periods which were capable of storing huge amounts of grain. Indeed the highly developed political, military and social organisation of the Picts could only have been supported by a wealthy agricultural and pastoral base and although farming in the uplands may have been at a subsistence level overall the Pictish economy was flourishing. |
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Post by Windischer on Sept 14, 2019 7:07:29 GMT -5
It relates the tale of how in the sixth century Columba travelled up Loch Ness into the heart of darkness to convert the Pictish King Brude in his stronghold somewhere near Inverness. On his way he vanquishes the Loch Ness Monster, the first ever mention of the beast in literature, miraculously shatters the iron locks of the stronghold gate and out miracles Brude's pagan priest in a show of Christian superiority. Impressive stuff, but the truth is probably much more mundane as it is unlikely Brude would have met Columba without some diplomatic groundwork probably laid by a Gaelic King of Dalriada. For all Columba's efforts in converting the Northern Picts there is not one single place in the area which commemorates him while there are a plethora of place names which honour Irish missionaries such as Tiernan, Brigid and Mochair. Make of it what you will, but the truth is the Northern Picts were probably converted by many Irish monks, while their Southern counterparts were Christianised by Northumbrian Clerics as related by Bede. It seems Columba got the kudos as he had a first rate PR man in Adomnan. I hope that goes some way to addressing your questions. It does. Irish Christianity fell out of favour at one point. Perhaps it's a bit far fetched, but if the Irish missionaries wrote any documents in Pictish, later on they could have been destroyed because they were seen as the work of heretics. Although I find it most likely that there never were any Pictish documents to begin with. I wonder how different Pictish really would be from other Brythonic languages? Wasn't the language of Strathclyde pretty much the same or at least very similar to Welsh? |
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Post by Deleted on Sept 14, 2019 8:21:48 GMT -5
It does. Irish Christianity fell out of favour at one point. Perhaps it's a bit far fetched, but if the Irish missionaries wrote any documents in Pictish, later on they could have been destroyed because they were seen as the work of heretics. Although I find it most likely that there never were any Pictish documents to begin with. I wonder how different Pictish really would be from other Brythonic languages? Wasn't the language of Strathclyde pretty much the same or at least very similar to Welsh? Tim Clarkson in his book, Strathclyde: and the Anglo- Saxons in The Viking Age agrees with you "Its inhabitants were referred to by various names : Clutinenses (Latin: 'Clydefolk'), Britones (Latin: 'Britons'), Cumbrenses(Latin: ('Cumbrians') and Straecledwealas(Old English: 'Strathclyde Welsh'). They probably called themselves Cumbri, meaning 'Fellow-Countrymen' or 'compatriots', a name related to modern Welsh Cymry. Both names share the same meaning and a similar pronunciation, having been formed in what was essentially the same ancestral language." From this it is hard not to draw the conclusion that the P-Celtic (Brythonic) spoken by the Picts and the Brythonic spoken by the Britons of Strathclyde and the Welsh were very similar in nature and apart from the regional variations, one would obviously expect, I personally think they would have had little difficulty in communicating with each other. |
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Post by Deleted on Sept 14, 2019 9:01:19 GMT -5
For anyone interested in the early medieval period in North Britain I would recommend the following books as an excellent introduction:
Tim Clarkson: The Makers of Scotland: Picts, Romans, Gaels and Vikings
Tim Clarkson: The Men of the North: The Britons of Southern Scotland
Tim Clarkson: The Picts: A History
Tim Clarkson: Strathclyde: And the Anglo Saxons in the Viking Age
If you wish to read a more academic in depth study which does pre-suppose a familiarity with the period then I recommend this:
James E. Fraser: From Caledonia to Pictland: Scotland To 795 (The New Edinburgh History Of Scotland)
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