page_title: Scotland in the Early Middle Ages
section_title: Early Christianisation
hierarchical_section_title: Scotland in the Early Middle Ages / Religion / Early Christianisation
caption_attribution_description: Uploader's own photograph.
context_page_description: Scotland was divided into a series of kingdoms in the early Middle Ages, i.e. between the end of Roman authority in southern and central Britain from around 400 CE and the rise of the kingdom of Alba in 900 CE. Of these, the four most important to emerge were the Picts, the Gaels of Dál Riata, the Britons of Alt Clut, and the Anglian kingdom of Bernicia. After the arrival of the Vikings in the late 8th century, Scandinavian rulers and colonies were established on the islands and along parts of the coasts. In the 9th century, the House of Alpin combined the lands of the Scots and Picts to form a single kingdom which constituted the basis of the kingdom of Scotland.
  Scotland has an extensive coastline and vast areas of difficult terrain and poor agricultural land. In this period, more land became marginal due to climate change, resulting in relatively light human settlement, particularly in the interior and Highlands. Northern Britain lacked urban centres and settlements were based on farmsteads and around fortified positions such as brochs, with mixed-farming primarily based on self-sufficiency.
context_section_description: The roots of Christianity in Scotland can probably be found among the soldiers and ordinary Roman citizens in the vicinity of Hadrian's Wall. The archaeology of the Roman period indicates that the northern parts of the Roman province of Britannia were among the most Christianised in the island. Chi-Rho inscriptions and Christian grave-slabs have been found on the wall from the 4th century, and from the same period the Mithraic shrines (known as Mithraea) which existed along Hadrian's Wall were attacked and destroyed, presumably by Christians. After the departure of the Romans it is generally presumed that Christianity would have survived among the Bythonic enclaves such as Strathclyde, but retreated as the pagan Anglo-Saxons advanced, with their gods Tiw, Woden, Thor and Frig, all of whom gave their names to days of the week, and Eostre, whose name was appropriated for the spring festival of Easter. While British Christians continued to practice inhumation without grave goods, the pagan Anglo-Saxons are visible in the archaeological record from their practice of cremation and burial in urns, accompanied by extensive grave goods, perhaps designed to accompany the dead to the afterlife. However, despite growing evidence of Anglian settlement in southern Scotland, only one such grave has been found, at Dalmeny in East Lothian.
  The growth of Christianity in Scotland has been traditionally seen as dependent on Irish-Scots "Celtic" missionaries and to a lesser extent those from Rome and England. Celtic Christianity had its origins in the conversion of Ireland from late Roman Britain associated with St. Patrick in the 5th century. In the 6th century, monks from Ireland were operating on the British mainland. St Ninian is the figure associated with a monastery founded at Whithorn in what is now Galloway, although it is generally accepted that Ninian may be a later construct. St Columba left Ireland and founded the monastery at Iona off the West Coast of Scotland in 563 and from there carried out missions to the Scots of Dál Riata and the Picts. It seems likely that both the Scots and Picts had already begun to convert to Christianity before this period. Saint Patrick referred in a letter to "apostate Picts", suggesting that they had previously been Christian, while the poem Y Gododdin, set in the early 6th century does not remark on the Picts as pagans. Conversion of the Pictish élite seems likely to have run over a considerable period, beginning in the 5th century and not complete until the 7th.
  Among the key indicators of Christianisation are long-cist cemeteries that generally indicate Christian burials due to their east–west orientation, although this correlation has been challenged by recent research. These burials are found between the end of the Roman era and the 7th century, after which point they become rarer. They are concentrated strongly in eastern Scotland south of the Tay, in Angus, the Mearns, Lothian and the Borders. It is generally accepted among scholars that place-name element eccles-, from the Brythonic word for church, represents evidence of the British church of the Roman and immediate post-Roman period, most of which are located in the south-west, south and east. About a dozen inscribed stones of the 5th and 6th centuries, beginning with the so-called Latinus stone of Whithorn, dating to c. 450, indicate Christianity through their dedications and are spread across southern Scotland.
caption: The Monymusk Reliquary, or Brecbennoch as it was called, dates from c. 750, and purportedly enclosed bones of Columba, the most popular saint in Medieval Scotland
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