this page is random information about the ancient people known as the picts. The info on here isnt categorized or in any order so bear with me! This is just a hodge podge of info that I gathered from the net and put here for you to check out. These are a bunch of excerpts from various websites regarding the picts. If you want to check into it further the links at the bottom of the page have the full articles. Some of the info is conflicting but the truth of the matter is the picts died off so long ago their history is very sketchy....
"Rather than painting themselves, other historical records suggest they actually tattooed their faces and bodies. Irregardless, they were mighty warriors, holding off Romans, Angles, and Vikings before their culture was absorbed by the Scots. The Hadrian and Antonine Walls are a tribute to the fear they instilled in Roman hearts."
The Scots originally migrated from the Irish isles (approx 400- 500 AD) and did not fare too well their first three centuries in Scotland, losing to the Britons in the south, and the Picts in the west. Indeed, the Picts continued as the strongest force in the land for 300 years more, both numerically and politically.
Pictish society was one of the very few matrilineal societies of ancient Europe (setting them quite apart from the Irish and British), with kingship conferred through the mother. This is how Kenneth McAlpin, first Scottish King of the Scots and the Picts, came to the throne - his mother was a Pictish princess. This is said to be how the pictish reign came to an end. They say McAlpin killed the members of all seven Pictish royal houses to secure the throne. Such ruthlessness paid off, though. While some future kings were styled "King of the Scots" or "King of the Picts", all were buried on Iona as Scottish kings and the name of the country became "Scotia".
The Scots assimilated the Picts into thier own society via marriages (Being that pictish kingship was decided through the mother) and the Picts and Scots became one.
Mac Alpin, the first Scottish King
The sources for facts of how Kenneth Mac Alpin, the avenging son of the slain Alpin, became King of Picts and Scots are few and suspect. Two such sources, The Prophecy of St. Berchan, and De Instructione Principus note that in 841 AD Mac Alpin attacked the remnants of the Pictish army and defeated them (he is lauded as "the raven feeder").
Mac Alpin then invites the Pictish king Drust IX and the remaining Pictish nobles to Scone to perhaps settle the issue of Dalriada's freedom or MacAlpin's claim to the Dalriadic crown. Faced with a recently victorious MacAlpin in the south, and a devastated army in the north, Drust, as well as all claimants to the Pictish throne from the seven royal houses attend this meeting at Scone. Legend has it that the Scots came secretly armed to Scone, where Drust and the Pictish nobles were killed.
a great banquet was held at Scone, and the Pictish King and his nobles were plied with drinks and became quite drunk. Once the Picts were drunk, the Scots allegedly pulled bolts from the benches, trapping the Picts in concealed earthen hollows under the benches; additionally, the traps were set with sharp blades, such that the falling Picts impaled themselves. Trapped and unable to defend themselves, the surviving Picts were then murdered from above and their bodies, clothes and ornaments "plundered."
The Picts were a confederation of tribes in central and northern Scotland from the 3rd century to the 10th century. They lived to the north of the Forth and Clyde. They were the descendants of the Caledonii and other tribes named by Roman historians or found on the map of Ptolemy. Pictland, also known as Pictavia, became the kingdom of Alba during the 10th century and the Picts became the Albannach or Scots.
The name which the Picts called themselves is unknown. The Latin word Picti is taken to mean painted or tattooed people.[1] The Gaels of Ireland and Dál Riata called the Picts Cruithne, (e.g. Old Irish cru(i)then-túath).[2] There were also Cruithne in Ulster, in particular the kings of Dál nAraidi.[3] The Britons and early Welsh of the south knew them as Prydyn, or the more modern pryd; Britain and Briton come from the same root.[4] Their Old English name gave the modern Scots form Pechts.
Archaeology gives an impression of the society of the Picts. Although very little in the way of Pictish writing has survived, Pictish history, from the late 6th century onwards, is known from a variety of sources, including Saints' lives, such as that of Columba by Adomnán, and various Irish annals. Although the popular impression of the Picts may be one of an obscure, mysterious people, this is far from being the case. When compared with the generality of Northern, Central and Eastern Europe in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages, Pictish history and society are well attested.[6]
Popular etymology has long interpreted the name Pict as if it derived from the Latin the word Picti meaning "painted folk" or possibly "tattooed ones"; and this may relate to the Welsh word Pryd meaning "to mark" or "to draw". Julius Caesar, who never went near Pictland, mentions the British Celtic custom of body painting in Book V of his Gallic Wars, stating
Omnes vero se Britanni vitro inficiunt, quod caeruleum efficit colorem, atque hoc horridiores sunt in pugna aspectu,
which means
In fact all Britanni stain themselves with vitrum, which produces a dark blue colour, and by this means they are more terrifying to face in battle.
The phrase vitro inficiunt is traditionally translated as "stain with woad", but could as well have meant “infect with glass”-describing a scarification ritual which left dark blue scars-or “dye with glaze”, forming a direct reference to tattooing. Subsequent commentators may have displaced the 1st-century BC southern practices (of the Brittani, a tribe south of the Thames) to the northern peoples in an attempt to explain the name Picti, which came into use only in the 3rd century AD. Julius Caesar himself, commenting in his Gallic Wars on the tribes from the areas where Picts (later) lived, states that they have “designs carved into their faces by iron”.
If they used woad, then it probably penetrated under the skin as a tattoo, but there is some recent controversy over this as the woad damages the skin to produce scar tissue, but the blue colour is lost. More likely, the Celts used copper for blue tattoos (they had plenty of it) and soot-ash carbon for black. Further study of bog bodies may provide more information on the specific tattooing techniques used by the Picts.
Pictish clans were said to be named for animals and clan members decorated themselves in tribal designs according to thier specific clans. Carvings of various clan animals have been discovered all over Scotland and northern england.
Information on the Picts, the "barbarians" who so often ravaged the Britons from the north, is somewhat scarce. The only text left to us by the Picts is their king-list, which gives the names and the lengths of the reigns of 60 or more Pictish kings. The list ends with Causantin mac Cinaeda, who died in 876. Thereafter, this record of the Picts was no longer used. The only other written source from around the Arthurian era is Adomnan's Life of Columba. Archaeological evidence for their lifestyles is also scarce.
The domain of the Picts was what we consider today to be Scotland. The terms "Picts" and "Pictland" were used in speaking of the inhabitants and the area up until 900, when the country began to be called "Alba."
The Picts had a warrior society, "and warlords needed strongholds. When Columba visited the Pictish king, Bridei, son of Maelchon, in 565, he went to one of the royal fortresses; it was 'near the river Ness' and the most widely accepted identification is Castle Urguhart on Loch Ness... where the medieval castle overlies earlier occupation..." (Nicoll 23) Several Pictish forts have been excavated, revealing that the warlords lived in style, wearing great silver chains and beautiful jewelry. A Pict's life was not altogether different than that of his southern Celtic neighbors; they all spoke a very similar language, as the Pictish language is convincingly argued to have been P-Celtic or Brittonic.
Some archaeological information comes from uncovered buried Pictish hoards. Brooches and dress-pins have survived from these hoards. The absence of grave-goods, indicating that the Picts did not think much of the practice of burying valuables with the dead, "presumably has implications for their pagan concept of death" .
Small painted stones used as charms, distinctively Pictish, have also been found.
For an exhaustive bibliography and a small over-view of the Picts, as well as a continuation of the information on this page, check out A Pictish Panorama: The Story of the Picts and a Pictish Bibliography, edited by Eric H. Nicoll, printed by Pinkfoot Press in 1995.
Pict areas of inhabitation
"Cruithne son of Cinge, the father of the Picts reigned for 100 years. He had seven sons, whose names were Fib, Fidach, Fotlaig, Fortrenn, Cait, Ce and Circinn."
Cat ruled for twelve years over the area now known as Caithness, Sutherland, West Highlands and Northern and Western Isles. The name means 'Cat People'.
Fidach ruled for forty years over the area now known as Moray, Nairn and Ross. The name means 'Woodsman'.
Ce ruled for fifteen years over the areas now known as Banff, Buchan and parts of Aberdeenshire. The name Ce may survive in the town of Keith.
Fotla (or Foltlaig) ruled for thirty years over the area now known as Athol and Gowrie. Fotla was a Goddess of Ireland.
Circinn (or Cirech) ruled for sixty years over the area now known as Angus and the Mearns. The name means 'crest headed. Skene highlights a Crus (son of Cirech) who was a warrior of the Picts. A battle was fought on the plain of Circinn against the Scots.
Fortriu (or Fortran) ruled for seventy years over the area now known as Strathearn and Menteith. The name may mean 'people of the slow winding river'.
Fib ruled for twenty four years over the area now known as Fife and Kinross. In the book of Deer the people of fife are called the 'cu-sidhe'; fairy hounds.
Here are links to more info if you are interested.
Grave slabs and Pictish Symbols of Scotland
http://www.darkisle.com/picts.html
Pictish Nation- a ton of info!
http://halfmoon.tripod.com/
Lost civilizations: the picts
http://www.tartans.com/articles/pictcivilization.html
http://www.scotshistoryonline.co.uk/thepicts.html
