This publication is the culmination of an extended programme of conferences that have sought to mark the contribution of F. T. Wainwright to Pictish studies and, in particular, the 50th anniversary of The Problem of the Picts. The book is firmly in the tradition of interdisciplinary scholarship Wainwright did so much to promote and brings together much fresh thinking on the archaeological, art-historical, place name and historical understanding of Northern Britain in the second half of the first millennium AD. Within a wider, European framework it addresses questions of landscape, material culture and mentalities, revealing some of the different strategies by which the Picts made their world. All the studies are accessibly presented to serve the interests of students, teachers and anyone interested in the roots of European civilisation. Contributors are Barbara E. Crawford, Nicholas Evans, Iain Fraser, James Fraser, Meggen Gondek, Stratford Halliday, Andrew Heald, Kellie Meyer, Gordon Noble, Robert D. Stevick, Simon Taylor and Sarah Winlow.

The Picts were an ancient nation who ruled most of northern and eastern Scotland during the Dark Ages. Despite their historical importance, they remain shrouded in myth and misconception. Absorbed by the kingdom of the Scots in the ninth century, they lost their unique identity, their language and their vibrant artistic culture. Amongst their few surviving traces are standing stones decorated with incredible skill and covered with enigmatic symbols - vivid memorials of a powerful and gifted people who bequeathed no chronicles to tell their story, no sagas to describe the deed of their kings and heroes. In this book Tim Clarkson pieces together the evidence to tell the story of this mysterious people from their emergence in Roman times to their eventual disappearance.

When the Romans came north to what is now modern Scotland they encountered the fierce and proud warrior society known as the Picts, who despite their lack of discipline and arms, managed to prevent the undefeated Roman Army from conquering the northern part of Britain, just as they later repulsed the Angles and the Vikings.A New History of the Picts is an accessible true history of the Picts, who are so often misunderstood. New historical analysis, recently discovered evidence and an innovative Scottish perspective will expose long held assumptions about the native people.This controversial text contests that Scottish history has long since been dominated and distorted by misleading perspectives. A New History of the Picts discredits the idea that the Picts were a strange historical anomaly and shows them to be the descendants of the original inhabitants of the land, living in a series of loose tribal confederations gradually brought together by external forces to create one of the earliest states in Europe: a people, who after repulsing all invaders, merged with their cousins, the Scots of Argyll, to create modern Scotland. All of Scotland descends from the fierce Picts.