Scotland in the Early Middle Ages
Scotland was divided into a series of kingdoms in the Early Middle Ages, i.e. between the end of Roman authority in southern and central Britain from around 400 AD and the rise of the kingdom of Alba in 900 AD. Of these, the four most important to emerge were the Picts, the Gaels of Dál Riata, the Britons of Alt Clut, and the Anglian kingdom of Bernicia. After the arrival of the Vikings in the late 8th century, Scandinavian rulers and colonies were established on the islands and along parts of the coasts. In the 9th century, the House of Alpin combined the lands of the Scots and Picts to form a single kingdom which constituted the basis of the Kingdom of Scotland.
Scotland has an extensive coastline, vast areas of difficult terrain and poor agricultural land. In this period, more land became marginal due to climate change, resulting in relatively light human settlement, particularly in the interior and Highlands. Northern Britain lacked urban centres and settlements were based on farmsteads and around fortified positions such as brochs, with mixed farming primarily based on self-sufficiency. In this period, changes in settlement and colonisation meant that the Pictish and Brythonic languages began to be subsumed by Gaelic, Scots, and, at the end of the period, by Old Norse. Life expectancy was relatively low, leading to a young population, with a ruling aristocracy, freemen, and relatively large numbers of slaves. Kingship was multi-layered, with different kings surrounded by their warbands that made up the most important elements of armed forces, and who engaged in both low-level raiding and occasional longer-range, major campaigns.
Some highly distinctive monumental and ornamental art, culminating in the development of the Insular art style, are common across Britain and Ireland. The most impressive structures included nucleated hill forts and, after the introduction of Christianity, churches and monasteries. The period also saw the beginnings of Scottish literature in British, Old English, Gaelic and Latin languages.
History
By the time of Bede and Adomnán, in the late seventh century and early eighth century, four major circles of influence had emerged in northern Britain. In the east were the Picts, whose kingdoms eventually stretched from the river Forth to Shetland. In the west were the Gaelic -speaking people of Dál Riata with their royal fortress at Dunadd in Argyll, with close links with the island of Ireland, from which they brought with them the name "Scots", originally a term for the inhabitants of Ireland. In the south was the British Kingdom of Alt Clut, descendants of the peoples of the Roman-influenced kingdoms of "The Old North". Finally, there were the English or "Angles", Germanic invaders who had overrun much of southern Britain and held the Kingdom of Bernicia, in the south-east, and who brought with them Old English.Picts
The confederation of Pictish tribes that developed north of the Firth of Forth may have stretched up as far as Orkney. It probably developed out of the tribes of the Caledonii, perhaps as a response to the pressure exerted by the presence of the Romans to the south. They first appear in Roman records at the end of the 3rd century as the picti when Roman forces campaigned against them. The first identifiable king of the Picts, who seems to have exerted a superior and wide-ranging authority, was Bridei mac Maelchon. His power was based in the kingdom of Fidach, and his base was at the fort of Craig Phadrig, near modern Inverness. After his death, leadership seems to have shifted to the Fortriu, whose lands were centred on Moray and Easter Ross and who raided along the eastern coast into modern England. Christian missionaries from Iona appear to have begun the conversion of the Picts to Christianity from 563.In the 7th century, the Picts acquired Bridei map Beli as a king, perhaps imposed by the kingdom of Alt Clut, where his father Beli I and then his brother Eugein I ruled. At this point the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Bernicia was expanding northwards, and the Picts were probably tributary to them until, in 685, Bridei defeated them at the Battle of Dunnichen in Angus, killing their king, Ecgfrith. In the reign of Óengus mac Fergusa, the Picts appear to have reached the height of their influence, defeating the forces of Dál Riata, invading Alt Clut and Northumbria, and making the first known peace treaties with the English. Succeeding Pictish kings may have been able to dominate Dál Riata, with Caustantín mac Fergusa perhaps placing his son Domnall on the throne from 811.
Dál Riata
The Gaelic overkingdom of Dál Riata was on the western coast of modern Scotland, with some territory on the northern coasts of Ireland. It probably ruled from the fortress of Dunadd, now near Kilmartin in Argyll and Bute. In the late 6th and early 7th centuries, it encompassed roughly what is now Argyll and Bute and Lochaber in Scotland, and also County Antrim in Ireland. Dál Riata is commonly viewed as having been an Irish Gaelic colony in Scotland, although some archaeologists have recently argued against this. The inhabitants of Dál Riata are often referred to as Scots, from Latin scotti, a name used by Latin writers for the inhabitants of Ireland. Its original meaning is uncertain, but it later refers to Gaelic-speakers, whether from Ireland or elsewhere.In 563, a mission from Ireland under St. Columba founded the monastery of Iona off the west coast of Scotland, and probably began the conversion of the region to Christianity. The kingdom reached its height under Áedán mac Gabráin, but its expansion was checked at the Battle of Degsastan in 603 by Æthelfrith of Northumbria. Serious defeats in Ireland and Scotland in the time of Domnall Brecc ended Dál Riata's golden age, and the kingdom became a client of Northumbria, then a subject to the Picts. There is disagreement over the fate of the kingdom from the late 8th century onwards. Some scholars argue that Dál Riata underwent a revival under king Áed Find, before the arrival of the Vikings.
Alt Clut
The kingdom of Alt Clut took its name from the Northern Brittonic for 'rock of the Clyde', today's Dumbarton Rock, which derives from the Gaelic for 'fort of the Britons'.The kingdom may have had its origins with the Damnonii people of Ptolemy's Geographia. Two kings are known from near-contemporary sources in this early period. The first is Coroticus or Ceretic, known as the recipient of a letter from Saint Patrick, and stated by a 7th-century biographer to have been king of the Height of the Clyde, Dumbarton Rock, placing him in the second half of the 5th century. From Patrick's letter it is clear that Ceretic was a Christian, and it is likely that the ruling class of the area were also Christians, at least in name. His descendant Rhydderch Hael is named in Adomnán's Life of Saint Columba.
After 600, information on the Britons of Alt Clut becomes more common in the sources. In 642, led by Eugein son of Beli, they defeated the men of Dál Riata and killed Domnall Brecc, grandson of Áedán, at Strathcarron. The kingdom suffered a number of attacks from the Picts under Óengus, and later the Picts' Northumbrian allies between 744 and 756. They lost the region of Kyle in the southwest of modern Scotland to Northumbria, and the last attack may have forced the king Dumnagual III to submit to his neighbours. After this, little is heard of Alt Clut or its kings until Alt Clut was besieged and captured by Vikings in 870, at which point the Clyde Britons seem to have reconstituted a kingdom based on a centre at Partick and the Clyde Britons' existing Christian centre at Govan, home of The Govan Stones.
Bernicia
The Brythonic successor states of what is now the modern Anglo-Scottish border region are referred to by Welsh scholars as part of Yr Hen Ogledd. This included the kingdoms of Bryneich, which may have had its capital at modern Bamburgh in Northumberland, and Gododdin, centred on Din Eidyn and stretching across modern Lothian. Some "Angles" may have been employed as mercenaries along Hadrian's Wall during the late Roman period. Others are thought to have migrated north from Deira in the early 6th century. At some point the Angles took control of Bryneich, which became the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Bernicia. The first Anglo-Saxon king in the historical record is Ida, who is said to have obtained the throne around 547. Around 600, the Gododdin raised a force of about 300 men to assault the Anglo-Saxon stronghold of Catraeth, perhaps Catterick, North Yorkshire. The battle, which ended disastrously for the Britons, was memorialised in the poem Y Gododdin.Ida's grandson, Æthelfrith, united Deira with his own kingdom, killing its king Æthelric to form Northumbria around 604. Ætherlric's son returned to rule both kingdoms after Æthelfrith had been defeated and killed by the East Anglians in 616, presumably bringing with him the Christianity to which he had converted while in exile. After his defeat and death at the hands of the Welsh and Mercians at the Battle of Hatfield Chase on 12 October 633, Northumbria again was divided into two kingdoms under pagan kings. Oswald, defeated the Welsh and appears to have been recognised by both Bernicians and Deirans as king of a united Northumbria. He had converted to Christianity while in exile in Dál Riata and looked to Iona for missionaries, rather than to Canterbury. The island monastery of Lindisfarne was founded in 635 by the Irish monk Saint Aidan, who had been sent from Iona at the request of King Oswald. It became the seat of the Bishop of Lindisfarne, which stretched across Northumbria. In 638 Edinburgh was attacked by the English and at this point, or soon after, the Gododdin territories in Lothian and around Stirling came under the rule of Bernicia. After Oswald's death fighting the Mercians, the two kingdoms were divided again, with Deira possibly having sub-kings under Bernician authority, but from this point the English kings were Christian and after the Synod of Whitby in 664, the Northumbrian kings accepted the primacy of Canterbury and Rome. In the late 7th century, the Northumbrians extended their influence north of the Forth, until they were defeated by the Picts at the Battle of Nechtansmere in 685.