Kinneddar

Abstract

The early Christian sculpture from Kinneddar has long been noted as a major assemblage. New survey work by the University of Aberdeen and AOC Archaeology has identified a large vallum enclosure around the site that was renewed on at least one occasion. The vallum enclosures surrounded an area of up to 8.6ha, and the groundplan presents striking resemblances to other major ecclesiastical sites, particularly Iona. Evaluative excavations instigated through research- and development-led projects have provided an outline chronology for the vallum enclosures, identified an additional annexe and has located settlement features inside the enclosures. Radiocarbon dating suggests activity as early as the late 6th century with the vallum likely to date to the 7th or 8th century. This article sets out the evidence from the site and discusses Kinneddar in relation to other likely major ecclesiastical sites in northern Pictland and its wider early medieval Insular context.

New zooarchaeological evidence from Pictish sites in Scotland: implications for early medieval economies and animal-human relationships

“…Our understanding of the socio-political organization of Pictland is poor, but there are securely documented Pictish kings from the 6th century onwards and there was an overkingship of Pictland from at least the 7th century AD, centered initially around the Moray Firth region (Woolf, 2006), with the center of power shifting southwards in the Viking Age (Noble and Evans, 2022, p. 290-293). With regards to the archaeology, recent excavations, have begun to reveal a whole host of new sites and evidence providing important insights into the functioning of Pictish society and the international connections that rulers in Pictland were able to draw upon (Carver et al, 2016;Noble et al, 2019aNoble et al, ,c, 2020.…”

“…Britain and Pictland (Figure 1), in particular, appear as zooarchaeological blackholes when compared to contemporary neighbors like Ireland andEngland (O'Connor, 2011, 2014;McCormick, 2014;McCormick and Murray, 2017). In Pictland, the main underlying reason is the limited number of sites that have been identified and investigated (Foster, 2014, p. 105-106;Noble et al, 2019a;Noble, 2020), combined with poor bone preservation due to acidic soils. Faunal assemblages large enough to generate valuable interpretative data have been limited to a handful of sites located on coastal or insular sandy soils, mostly in the northwestern-most edges of Pictland (Dockrill et al, 2010)…”