The archæology and prehistoric annals of Scotland

by Sir Daniel Wilson

The death of the primitive Scottish Bishop St. Ninian took place A.D. 432. According to the accepted biography of St. Patrick it was in the following year that Pope Celestine consecrated him a Bishop, and sent him on his mission to Ireland. But the labours of the Scottish missionary had not been in vain. "The brethren of St. Ninian at Whithern" became the centre of an important movement, influencing a large and rapidly increasing sphere, and from their labours there is reason to believe that both England and Ireland received the first impressions towards that great movement which ultimately included the British Isles within the ecclesiastical unity of papal Christendom. It furnishes no inconclusive evidence of the progress of the new faith in the British Isles, that St. Palladius was sent from Rome to the Christian Scots, towards the middle of the fifth century, for the purpose of uprooting the Pelagian heresy. His chief mission was to Ireland, where the Scots were then settled, but he also cared for the converts of the neighbouring isle, then connected with Ireland both by frequent intercourse and by affinity of races. He personally visited the Christian Picts of North Britain, and despatched his disciple St. Servanus, or St. Serf, as he is more usually styled, to the Northern Islands, for the purpose of preaching the true faith to the natives of Orkney and Shetland. That he also was successful many local names and traditions, and even some ecclesiological relics, hereafter referred to, suffice to prove, and thus we arrive at the important fact, that Christianity had already established a firm footing, both in the Scottish mainland and the isles, long before we have any evidence of the presence of the Scandinavians, even as roving marauders, on our coasts. The value of this will be at once apparent, as shewing the necessity which authentic history imposes upon us of referring to a period long anterior to the intrusion of the earliest Scandinavian colonists into Scotland, the erection of the monolithic structures, memorial cairns, and other primitive monuments, which fanciful theorists have assigned, without evidence, to such foreign origin. It is uncertain how long St. Palladius was in Scotland, but his last days were spent there, and he died among his Cruithnean converts at Fordun, in Mag-girgin, or the Mearns. We find good evidence that the influence of his preaching was not evanescent. Before the end of the fifth century churches had been founded, and brotherhoods of priests established, both in the islands and on the mainland; and Bede relates that, in the beginning of the eighth century, while yet the Dalriadic Scots remained within the narrow limits of their first possessions in the Western Highlands, the Pictish king sent to his own monastery of Jarrow, craving that builders might be commissioned to construct for him a church of stone after the Roman manner. From this we are led to infer that the "mos Scotorum" referred to by Bede, of building both houses and churches of timber and wattles, was also the "mos Pictorum" of the same period; but Dr. Petrie has already conclusively established the fact that this custom prevailed only to a very limited extent in Ireland, and contemporarily with the erection of religious structures of so substantial a nature that characteristic examples of them still remain in sufficient preservation to shew perfectly what they had been in their original state. It is indeed from Adomnan's Life of St. Columba that Dr. Petrie produces the earliest historical authority which satisfactorily proves the erection of a round tower in the sixth century.[521] We search in vain for such primitive ecclesiastical structures in Scotland, or even for the stone churches which Boniface and other Italian builders, sent at King Nectan's desire, are said to have built at Invergowrie, Tealing, and Restennet in Angus, at Rosemarky in Ross, as well as in other parts of the kingdom of the Northern Picts. Yet it will be hereafter seen that we are not without some evidence of the character of primitive Scottish churches "built after the Roman manner."

Besides the primitive Christian missionaries referred to as bringing tidings of the new faith to Scotland, St. Rule, St. Adrian, St. Woloc, St. Kieran, and St. Kentigern, must each be noted as sharing in the good work. But the religious establishment which St. Columba founded at Iona, in the middle of the sixth century, is justly regarded as the true centre of all the most sacred and heart-stirring associations connected with the establishment of Christianity in Scotland. "That illustrious island, which was once the luminary of the Caledonian regions," still awakens feelings in the mind of every thoughtful visitor, such as no other Scottish locality can give birth to, unless a Scotsman may be pardoned if he associate with it, not "the plain of Marathon," but the field of Bannockburn. We look in vain for any natural features in this remarkable island to account for its selection as the centre of primitive Christian missions in Britain. It is only about two and a half miles in length, and one in breadth. The waves of the Atlantic dash, with almost unceasing roar, against the rugged granite cliffs which guard its southern and western coasts; and but for the memory of its sacred historical associations, and of its ancient magnificence which has utterly passed away, there is nothing about the little island, placed far amid the melancholy main, that could now tempt the most curious traveller to approach its shores. St. Kieran, the favourite Celtic saint, was the precursor of St. Columba, and even it is said his instructor in the faith. He came from Ireland in 503, with the sons of Ere, thus celebrated in the Albanic Duan as converts of St. Patrick,—

"The sons of Erc, son of Eathach the prosperous,
The three who obtained the blessing of Saint Patrick."

The cave of St. Kieran is still shewn in Kintyre, where the first Christian teacher of the Western Highlands is believed to have made his abode. If the dates of this remote era may be relied on, it was not till upwards of half a century after the arrival of St. Kieran, that the great Apostle of Scotland landed on its shores. The record of Bede is equally simple and precise,—"Anno DLXV. Columba presbyter de Scotia venit Brittaniam ad docendos Pictos, et in insula Hii monasterium fecit." The isolation of that little island might perhaps be thought to have proved an attraction to Colum M'Felim M'Fergus, when he abandoned Ireland in his rude currach, or boat of hides, and sought an asylum among the Scottish Picts. But the old Celtic traditions seem rather to indicate, that in the true missionary spirit he bearded the ancient faith in its stronghold, and reared the primitive Christian fane of Iona, where of old the Pagan circle had stood. The name of Hii, or I, by which the sacred isle is most generally known, signifies emphatically The Island. It is also familiar to us as Ii-Cholum Chille, or the Island of Columba's Cell; but the Highlanders, to the present day, frequently apply to it the name of Innis nan Druidheanach, or the Island of the Druids, or magicians. The first structure reared by St. Columba and his followers on Iona, was doubtless as humble as the little currach by which they had reached its shores. One curious passage, already referred to, speaks of the Abbot as sending forth his monks to gather bundles of twigs with which to build their Hospice. The little chapel of St. Oran, the first follower of St. Columba who found a grave in the sacred soil, still exists, and has been frequently described as a work of the sixth century, but the experienced ecclesiologist will feel little hesitation in dating it full six centuries later. It is not indeed at such spots as Whithern or Iona that we are to look for the existence of primitive structures. The veneration which made these the favourite resorts of pilgrims for many centuries, was little likely to permit the first homely fane to continue, at a period when the re-edifying of churches and monasteries, on a larger and more magnificent scale, was one of the readiest exponents of the piety or contrition which the Church inculcated on its disciples. If any of the primitive Scottish churches still exist, they must be looked for in localities less favoured by the fidelity of medieval piety or superstition.

Christianity we thus perceive was established in Scotland at a very early period, altogether apart from any contemporary intercourse which England may have maintained more directly with the converts of the neighbouring continent. Several important centres were fixed at various points, including the extreme south-west of Scotland, the remote northern, and the western Isles. From these the faith rapidly radiated to the whole surrounding regions, and was even carried by the youthful zeal of the new converts to distant shores. The Icelandic Sagas furnish abundant proof of the conversion of the natives of North Britain and Ireland long prior to Scandinavia, and of the direct influence which they exercised in the Christianizing of the north. When Norsemen first visited Iceland in the latter half of the ninth century, it was uninhabited, but they discovered traces of the former presence of Irish monks, and found their books, crosiers, and bells. This account, derived from the Sagas, receives independent confirmation from the narrative of Dicuil, an Irish monk of the ninth century, who states that monks from Ireland had resided in Iceland for six months, and also visited the Færo Islands, and found them uninhabited.[522] There also existed in ancient times a church in Iceland dedicated to St. Columba, and a native Icelander is described as having been educated by an abbot named Patrick, in the Western Isles of Scotland or Ireland. We likewise find in the names of several of the northern Scottish Islands, and in the traces of the dedications of their earliest churches, ample confirmation of their inhabitants having been Christianized prior to any Scandinavian settlement. The islands of North and South Ronaldshay are now distinguished by their relative positions, but their ancient names are Rinansey and Rögnvalsey. Professor P. A. Munch, of Christiania, adds in a letter referring to this subject,—"I have no doubt that the name of the island, before the Scandinavian settlement, was St. Ninian's Island, Ringan's Island, Ronan's Island, which involves the Christianity of the ancient Celtic population before the Norwegian settlement." It is not, however, with Scandinavian antiquaries that we have to contend in clearing up these points of national history, but with British writers, who vainly seek the sources of native arts and civilisation in those of nations younger than our own. Mr. Worsaae acknowledges that Ireland was Christianized several centuries before Scandinavia, and largely contributed towards the conversion of the latter to the new faith. Interesting traces still remain in the names of many Scottish localities of the primitive Christian colonies, and of the collegiate establishments founded, like that of Iona, in many of the northern and western Isles, several of which are mentioned by Adomnan in his Life of St. Columba. In the curious diploma addressed to Eric, king of Norway, respecting the genealogy of William Saint Clair, Earl of Orkney, drawn up by Thomas Tulloch, bishop of Orkney, about 1443,—wherein, for the sake of brevity, he lets pass many "notable operationis and gestis, and referrs ws till auld cronikis and genealogiis, autentik and approbat," the following notice occurs: "Sua we find that in the tyme of Harald Comate, first king of Norwege, this land, or contre insulare of Orchadie, was inhabitat and mainerit be twa nations callit Peti and Pape, quhilk twa nations, indeid, war all wterlie and clenlie destroyit be Norwegens, of the clan or tribe of the maist stowt Prince Rognald."[523] These were undoubtedly the native Celtic population, or Picts—of the total extermination of whom a document of the fifteenth century cannot be regarded as very conclusive evidence—and the Papæ or ecclesiastical fraternities sent forth from Iona. In the Life of St. Columba it is stated, that the Saint chancing to meet a prince of the Orkneys at the palace of King Brude, commended to his care some monks who had lately sailed to the Northern Seas, and the missionaries afterwards owed their life to his intercession.[524] The Landnáma states, that wherever the Norwegian settlers found monks, or remains of their establishments, they called the places by some name beginning with Pap, from pfaff, Papa, πάππας, a priest,—as Papey, the Priest's Island; Papuli, the Priest's district. In Orkney there are two Papeys; the larger Papa Westray, the smaller Papa Stronsay. In the mainland also there is Paplay, (Papuli); another Paplay in South Ronaldshay; in Shetland two Papeys, Papa Stour and Papa Little; and a Papill (Papilia) in Unst. In the Hebrides also there are two Pabbys, (Papey,) and a Pappadill in Rum. Adomnan mentions, besides his own monastery, those of Achaluing, Himba, Elanna-oma, and Kilduin; the three last supposed to be Oransay, Colonsay, and Loch Awe. Eig, Islay, Urquhart, Inchcolm in the Frith of Forth, Govan on the Clyde, and many other religious sites, are also ascribed, on more or less trustworthy authority, to the missionary zeal of St. Columba, and his immediate followers; while a still earlier origin is assigned, not without some evidence, to various of the ancient Culdee Houses reformed by David I., or merged by him in the magnificent monastic establishments which he founded. Great as was the influence of the Northmen in retarding the fruits of early missionary zeal, it is obvious that they rarely so effectually despoiled the Christian establishments as to permanently eradicate them, or break the traditional sanctity which has consecrated their sites to the service of religion even to our own day. Iona, burned in 802, was rebuilt in 806. Sixty-eight of the brethren perished by the hands of the Pagan Northmen the same year: yet in 814, we again find them founding and building. It is impossible, therefore, to avoid the conclusion that Christianity was very extensively diffused throughout North Britain, and that numerous ecclesiastical fraternities had been established on the mainland and surrounding islands long before the natives learned to watch the horizon for the plundering fleets of the Norse rovers.

It is not till the ninth century that we find authentic traces of the Scandinavian Vikings on the Scottish shores. While, however, we regard the Pagan Northmen in the light of lawless spoilers, preying on weaker or defenceless neighbours, we must beware of the error of supposing that they were no more than a barbarian race of pirates. On the contrary, they speedily substituted conquest for spoliation both in Scotland and Ireland, colonized the possessions they acquired, and established trade and commerce in lieu of robbery. They bore, indeed, no slight resemblance to the bold adventurers of a more civilized age, who followed Drake and Raleigh in their reprisals against Spanish America, and won reputation, still honoured in our naval annals, by means as inconsistent with the modern law of nations as the plundering expeditions of these old Scandinavian Vikings. The war-songs of the Northmen shew that such expeditions were the paths to honour as well as to wealth; nor was it till the milder tenets of Christianity had superseded the warrior-creed of Thor, that their plundering voyages came to an end. But unlike the British and Irish, the Scandinavians have a Pagan literature, contemporary with those scenes of adventure and bold deeds of arms: and so much the more valuable that it preserves a picture of the period uninfluenced by that corporate spirit which detracts so much from the contemporary monkish annals of our own and other countries. They had their sagaman, and their bard or skjalde, like the minstrel or troubadour of medieval Europe, whose chief business it was to rehearse the Sagas, and to compose songs and odes in commemoration of their victories and individual prowess. We must not, therefore, rob the old Pagan Norseman of the wild virtues of his age and creed, by bringing them to the standard of modern ideas and principles; but rather accept the characteristic picture of his Sagas as furnishing no unlikely portraiture of the hardy Caledonian warrior of an earlier age.

We know little that is definite regarding the Scandinavian expeditions to our shores till Harold Harfager, king of Norway, in the latter part of the ninth century, conquered first the Zetlands and then the Orkney Islands and Hebrides, and made himself master of the Isle of Man. The change from having the Norsemen as plunderers to that of having them as masters, was probably altogether beneficial, though not unaccompanied with much violence and suffering. Previously to this period, their ravages appear to have been incessant, and very frequently successful, both on the Scottish and Irish coasts. They repeatedly assailed and plundered the Christian community of Iona; and the annals of Ulster record that the Gentiles, as they are usually termed, completely spoiled the establishment in the year 802, and expelled the family of Iona from the sacred Isle. They seem to have treated in a like manner the various religious communities settled on the different islands above referred to, and still commemorated in the old Scandinavian names which they conferred on them; though, as has been shewn, the followers of St. Columba, and no doubt other fraternities, speedily rebuilt their establishments. Even at that early period, some amount of wealth would be accumulated in the muniment chests of the monasteries, and doubtless the poorest of them would endeavour to provide the chalice, paten, and other indispensable furniture of the church and altar, of the precious metals. These must have supplied a fresh incentive to the plundering Vikings, and thus the early incursions of the Northmen largely contributed to retard the diffusion of the faith among the native Britons, while their own divisions and internal struggles furnished frequent opportunities for the unchecked descent of the spoilers on their coasts. Nor was it plunder alone that the fierce Northmen bore away from our shores. Both the Irish annals and the Icelandic Sagas testify to the fact, that they frequently loaded their vessels with captives, both male and female, who were sold elsewhere for slaves. There even appear to have been regular markets in Norway and Sweden where the captive Scots and Picts were disposed of, and some of the names still in use in Iceland are believed to be derived from such foreign captives: the female slave having occasionally won the favour of her master, and been wedded even to leaders and kings. While, however, the Norse marauders were making descents with increased frequency on our shores, a revolution was taking place in Norway, somewhat akin to that which placed the Dalriadic chief on the Pictish throne. Harold Harfager, after a protracted struggle, established himself as absolute king of Norway; and such of the Vikings as had been active in opposing his ambitious projects could no longer winter in safety within the viks or inlets of their indented coast, from whence they derive their name. Many of these, therefore, who had before paid occasional visits to our shores, now established their head-quarters in the Scottish Hebrides, the numerous bays and inlets of which afforded the shelter and protection for their long-oared galleys formerly sought in their native fiords. From this point d'appui they made incessant incursions on the newly-established kingdom of Norway, while they failed not also to harass and spoil the neighbouring Scottish coasts. Thus deprived of any settled home, and without an acknowledged leader, the Vikings assumed more than ever a piratical character, and became the terror of the whole north of Europe. King Harold failed not to offer effectual resistance to these rebellious Norsemen. Every summer the Norwegian fleet scoured the Scottish Seas, and compelled them to abandon their Hebridean settlements; but the hardy Vikings had little to fear from assailants who only drove them to the open sea, from whence, after a successful descent on some unguarded coast, and not unfrequently on that of their assailant, they returned in winter to the shelter of their old retreat.

After repeated expeditions of the same fruitless character against the rebellious Vikings, King Harold determined to put an end to their predatory incursions by making himself master of the islands which afforded them shelter. Accordingly, in the year 875, he collected a powerful fleet, which he commanded in person, and setting sail from Norway, he bore down on the Shetland and Orkney Isles and the Hebrides, slaying or driving out the piratical Vikings, spoiling their settlements, and taking possession of the islands. He then proceeded to the Isle of Man, which he found entirely deserted of its inhabitants, who had fled to the Scottish mainland on the approach of the fleet. Harold failed not to enrich his followers with the spoils of the Scottish coasts as they returned from this successful expedition, so that the unhappy natives were exposed to equal dangers from the Vikings and their Norwegian conquerors. They were not, however, reduced to abject fear by such repeated assaults. Harold bestowed the possession of the Northern Isles on Sigurd, the brother of Rognwald, a distinguished Norwegian chief, who accordingly became first Jarl of the Orkneys; and the fleet returned to Norway, leaving a force deemed sufficient to secure the newly conquered possessions. But the native chiefs of the islands and neighbouring coasts who had been spoiled and driven from their possessions by the Vikings, took advantage of their dispersion, and so soon as the Norwegian fleet had left the Scottish seas, they seized possession of the Hebrides, expelled or put to the sword the whole of the Norwegians left by Harold to hold them in his right, and resumed the occupation of their ancient possessions. A second Norwegian expedition followed under the guidance of Ketil, a distinguished chief, on whom Harold bestowed by anticipation the title of Jarl; and it is curious that in the "Islands Landnamabok," the natives who had recovered possession of the islands are termed Scottish and Irish Vikings, (Vikinger Skotar ok Irar,) sufficiently shewing the sense in which that term was understood by the Northmen in the beginning of the twelfth century. The Islesmen were unable to resist the overwhelming force, and appear to have been taken entirely by surprise. The Hebridean Jarl entered quietly into possession of his new dominions, and then took the first favourable opportunity of renouncing his allegiance to Harold and declaring himself independent King of the Hebrides.

It is not necessary to do more than glance at the subsequent history of the Scoto-Norwegian kingdoms. In 894, Thorstein the Red, the grandson of Ketil, formed a close alliance with Sigurd, then jarl of Orkney, and with their united forces they made themselves masters of the northern districts of Scotland, including Caithness, Sutherland, Ross, and Moray. Sigurd lost his life in this expedition in a remarkable manner. Having, according to the narration of the Ynglinga Saga,[525] slain Melbrigda Tönn, or Maolbride the Bucktoothed, one of the Scottish maormors or chiefs who derived his appellation from a peculiarly prominent tooth, he cut off the Maormor's head and hung it at his bridle. But from the violent motion as he galloped over the field, the tooth inflicted a wound on his leg, which inflamed, and ultimately caused his death. The record of this incident in contemporary sagas may suffice as an illustration of the barbarous warfare of the period. Sigurd was succeeded by his son Guttorm, as Jarl of Orkney, while Thorstein the Red assumed the title of king of the newly acquired possessions on the mainland; and thus within half a century after the Dalriadic king Kenneth had obtained possession of the throne of the Southern Picts by the aid of the Cruithne or Northern Picts, a large portion of the possessions of the latter were wrested from them and erected into a new kingdom under their foreign conqueror. The sovereignty of Thorstein, however, was of brief duration. He had scarcely held his newly acquired territories for six years when he had to take the field to oppose a force collected by the chiefs of the conquered possessions, under the command of Duncan, the maormor of Caithness. A fierce battle ensued, in which Thorstein was slain, his followers completely routed, and the Norwegians expelled from the Scottish mainland. This took place A.D. 900, and for nearly a century no farther aggression was attempted by the Norwegians, with the exception of the annexation of a part of Caithness to the Orkney jarldom, the result, as is believed, of an alliance between Thorfinn, the Orkney jarl, and the daughter of Duncan, maormor of Caithness. In A.D. 986 Sigurd, jarl of Orkney, once more conquered the north of Scotland, after having defeated Finlay, son of Ruari, maormor of Moray, in an attempt to recover Caithness from its Norwegian possessors. Frequent battles followed. The Norwegians were repeatedly defeated and driven from the mainland: but they returned with increased force and re-established their ground. Meanwhile, by the defeat and death of Kenneth M'Duff, Malcolm, maormor of Moray, became king of Scotland A.D. 1004, and soon after effected a reconciliation with Sigurd, jarl of Orkney, and gave him his daughter in marriage. Thus a mixture of Norwegian and Scottish blood took place, the fruit of which is still discernible in the striking contrast between the population of the northern islands and Scottish mainland and the Celtic races of the neighbouring Highlands.