Pict | People - Britannica

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External Websites

• University of Aberdeen - Shedding new light on Scotland�s mysterious Picts
• World History Encyclopedia - Pict
• Live Science - Who were the Picts, the early inhabitants of Scotland?
• Electricscotland.com - Picts
• National Center for Biotechnology Information - PubMed Central - Imputed genomes and haplotype-based analyses of the Picts of early medieval Scotland reveal fine-scale relatedness between Iron Age, early medieval and the modern people of the UK
• English Monarchs - The Picts

Pict people Ask Anything Homework Help Also known as: Picti Written and fact-checked by Britannica Editors Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree.... Britannica Editors History Britannica AI Ask Anything Table of Contents Table of Contents Ask Anything

Pict, (possibly from Latin picti, “painted”), one of an ancient people who lived in what is now eastern and northeastern Scotland, from Caithness to Fife. Their name may refer to their custom of body painting or possibly tattooing.

The origin of the Picts is uncertain; some evidence suggests that they were descendants of pre-Celtic aborigines, but some linguistic evidence suggests they spoke a Celtic language. The Picts were first noticed in ad 297, when a Roman writer spoke of the “Picts and Irish [Scots] attacking” Hadrian’s Wall. Their warfare with the Romans during the occupation was almost continual. By the 7th century there was a united “Pict-land,” which already had been penetrated by Christianity. In 843, Kenneth I MacAlpin, king of the Scots (centred in Argyll and Bute), became also king of the Picts, uniting their two lands in a new kingdom of Alba, which evolved into Scotland.

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The Pictish kingdom is notable for the stylized but vigorous beauty of its carved memorial stones and crosses. The round stone towers known as brochs, or “Pictish towers,” and the underground stone houses called weems, or “Picts’ houses,” however, both predate this kingdom.

This article was most recently revised and updated by Chelsey Parrott-Sheffer.