This edited volume explores how (what is today) Scotland can be compared with, contrasted to, or was connected with other parts of Early Medieval Europe. Far from a 'dark age', Early Medieval Scotland (AD 300-900) was a crucible of different languages and cultures, the world of the Picts, Scots, Britons and Anglo-Saxons. Though long regarded as somehow peripheral to continental Europe, people in Early Medieval Scotland had mastered complex technologies and were part of sophisticated intellectual networks.

This cross-disciplinary volume includes contributions focussing on archaeology, artefacts, art-history and history, and considers themes that connect Scotland with key processes and phenomena happening elsewhere in Europe. Topics explored include the transition from Iron Age to Early Medieval societies and the development of secular power centres, the Early Medieval intervention in prehistoric landscapes, and the management of resources necessary to build kingdoms.

Contents

Introduction
Alice Blackwell

Peripheral vision: Scotland in Early Medieval Europe
Ewan Campbell

'A bright crowd of chancels': whither early church archaeology in Scotland?
Sally M Foster

The 5-6th century Early Medieval Pictish power centre at Rhynie, north-east Scotland, and its European context
Meggen Gondek & Gordon Noble

Norrie's Law, Gaulcross and beyond: widening the context of hacksilver hoarding in Scotland
Alice Blackwell & Martin Goldberg

An Early Medieval and prehistoric nexus: the Strathearn Environs and Royal Forteviot project
Ewan Campbell, Stephen Driscoll, Meggen Gondek & Adrian Maldonado

Political transition at Portmahomack: the European context
Martin Carver

Early Medieval burial in European context: log coffins in Scotland
Adrian Maldonado

Pictish adventus: Christian iconography and the ideology of lordship
Martin Goldberg

Medieval European land assessment, Fortriu, and the dabhach
Alasdair Ross

Ideas of origins and ethnicity in Early Medieval Scotland
Nicholas Evans