From Pictland to Alba: Scotland, 789-1070 New Edinburgh History of Scotland: Amazon.co.uk: Alex Woolf: Books

Review

...a sometimes demanding, but often fascinating and always rewarding book, rich in ideas. -- Rab Houston BBC History Magazine Teasing out the tangle of sources and suggesting ways of filling in the blanks, Woolf comes closer than we've ever been to a coherent account of a fascinating time. 4 stars -- Michael Kerrigan The Scotsman An impressive piece of scholarship by one who has been in the vanguard of rewriting medieval Scottish history... Alex Woolf is to be commended for producing a work that greatly advances our understanding of what continues to be an obscure and challenging period in Scottish History. -- R. Andrew Macdonald Saga-Book The author of this masterly work presents and discusses the evidence of the available, often fragmentary, sources to provide an intelligible account of the eventual evolution of a very limited 'kingdom' of Alba. Northern History The author was charged with writing a political history of the kingdoms in North Britain between 789 and 1070. He has done this with aplomb and displayed a breadth of knowledge and understanding that would be hard to match... It is to Woolf's credit that he has managed to produce such a well-written account that effectively tackles a far wider frame of reference than any of his predecessors ever accomplished (or were willing to engage with), and it is the totality of his discussion that is so impressive. This book deserves to become a recommended text. -- Alasdair Ross, University of Stirling History Scotland Of all the periods of Scottish history, 789--1070 is the most obscure as it is one of the most formative; for that very reason Alex Woolf's success in distilling an intelligible and credible narrative makes this book a triumph... The balance of his approach is matched by the quality of his prose: it has an easy pace, a clarity of structure and the tone of civilised conversation. It is hard to think of how such a survey could be better done, given the difficulties of the evidence and the complexity of the changes in North Britain from the eighth to the eleventh century. -- T. M. Charles-Edwards, University of Oxford Innes Review I find an overriding sense of adventure in this volume, with ideas rolling thick and fast... Woolf repeatedly demonstrates a perceptive sense of place in his historical arguments, giving a valuable insight into the interplay of geography and history in Scotland's past. Woolf 's skills of close textual analysis are also brilliantly demonstrated throughout the volume... A striking and laudable feature of Woolf 's book is the concern to show Scotland in a bigger historical picture. Woolf often draws on parallels and insights from across medieval Europe. This is important in showing the value of comparative evidence to provide insights into Scottish history. This feature of Woolf 's work also highlights Scotland's potential significance for mainstream European medievalists. There is no doubt that this volume marks a major advance in interpreting the Viking Age istory of Scotland. Woolf demonstrates the breadth of vision and originality of mind which deservedly characterises him as one of the leading early medieval Insular historians. -- Claire Downham, University of Aberdeen Journal of Scottish Historical Studies From Pictland to Alba is an extremely valuable synthesis of recent scholarship, and a showcase for Woolf's original insights. The book is essential reading for scholars and its accessible style should ensure an extensive student readership. From Pictland to Alba will no doubt be considered a formative text by the next generation of scholars of early medieval Scottish History. -- Fiona Edmonds, Clare College, Cambridge Cambrian Medieval Celtic Studies ...a sometimes demanding, but often fascinating and always rewarding book, rich in ideas. Teasing out the tangle of sources and suggesting ways of filling in the blanks, Woolf comes closer than we've ever been to a coherent account of a fascinating time. 4 stars An impressive piece of scholarship by one who has been in the vanguard of rewriting medieval Scottish history... Alex Woolf is to be commended for producing a work that greatly advances our understanding of what continues to be an obscure and challenging period in Scottish History. The author of this masterly work presents and discusses the evidence of the available, often fragmentary, sources to provide an intelligible account of the eventual evolution of a very limited 'kingdom' of Alba. The author was charged with writing a political history of the kingdoms in North Britain between 789 and 1070. He has done this with aplomb and displayed a breadth of knowledge and understanding that would be hard to match... It is to Woolf's credit that he has managed to produce such a well-written account that effectively tackles a far wider frame of reference than any of his predecessors ever accomplished (or were willing to engage with), and it is the totality of his discussion that is so impressive. This book deserves to become a recommended text. Of all the periods of Scottish history, 789--1070 is the most obscure as it is one of the most formative; for that very reason Alex Woolf's success in distilling an intelligible and credible narrative makes this book a triumph... The balance of his approach is matched by the quality of his prose: it has an easy pace, a clarity of structure and the tone of civilised conversation. It is hard to think of how such a survey could be better done, given the difficulties of the evidence and the complexity of the changes in North Britain from the eighth to the eleventh century. I find an overriding sense of adventure in this volume, with ideas rolling thick and fast... Woolf repeatedly demonstrates a perceptive sense of place in his historical arguments, giving a valuable insight into the interplay of geography and history in Scotland's past. Woolf 's skills of close textual analysis are also brilliantly demonstrated throughout the volume... A striking and laudable feature of Woolf 's book is the concern to show Scotland in a bigger historical picture. Woolf often draws on parallels and insights from across medieval Europe. This is important in showing the value of comparative evidence to provide insights into Scottish history. This feature of Woolf 's work also highlights Scotland's potential significance for mainstream European medievalists. There is no doubt that this volume marks a major advance in interpreting the Viking Age istory of Scotland. Woolf demonstrates the breadth of vision and originality of mind which deservedly characterises him as one of the leading early medieval Insular historians. From Pictland to Alba is an extremely valuable synthesis of recent scholarship, and a showcase for Woolf's original insights. The book is essential reading for scholars and its accessible style should ensure an extensive student readership. From Pictland to Alba will no doubt be considered a formative text by the next generation of scholars of early medieval Scottish History.

Product Description

In the 780s northern Britain was dominated by two great kingdoms; Pictavia, centred in north-eastern Scotland and Northumbria which straddled the modern Anglo-Scottish border. Within a hundred years both of these kingdoms had been thrown into chaos by the onslaught of the Vikings and within two hundred years they had become distant memories. This book charts the transformation of the political landscape of northern Britain between the eighth and the eleventh centuries. Central to this narrative is the mysterious disappearance of the Picts and their language and the sudden rise to prominence of the Gaelic-speaking Scots who would replace them as the rulers of the North. From Pictland to Alba uses fragmentary sources which survive from this darkest period in Scottish history to guide the reader past the pitfalls which beset the unwary traveller in these dangerous times. Important sources are presented in full and their value as evidence is thoroughly explored and evaluated. Unlike most other volumes dealing with this period, this is a book which 'shows its workings' and encourages the readers to reach their own conclusions about the origins of Scotland. Key Features: * The first book in over twenty years to explain the destruction of the Picts and the rise of the Scottish kingdom from contemporary accounts alone * Recounts and evaluates modern scholarship developing readers' awareness of recent debates and controversies * Subjects contemporary sources to rigorous examination allowing students to appreciate the strengths and pitfalls of different types of evidence * Locates early Scottish history firmly within a European context

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

Disappointingly Limited 14 Mar 2012

By TR

Format:Paperback|Amazon Verified Purchase

I have been disappointed by the book, which is based so much on surviving documentation. This is undeniably limited for the period and domain in question, so large parts of the book reduce to textual and linguistic analysis of a few short annals and names of places and people. I had been expecting to read an account bringing together those meagre written sources, with evidence derived from excavations like those at Forteviot and Portmahomack, and artefacts like Pictish crosses. I would have hoped to learn something of how people lived, and how they made war, and perhaps even to have got some ideas about how many Picts and Scots there actually were, but little space is accorded to such matters. Towards the end of the book, the author comments that Alba only comprised a third of what we now know as Scotland, and the area he actually deals with cannot extend to much more than a third of Alba, since he has so little to say of the lands north of the Mounth, or indeed, the western seaboard north of the Clyde. I must also express some disappointment about the limited coverage of the immensely significant expansion of Alba to the south, but perhaps that is dealt with in the next volume.
The key event of his period was of course the apparent disappearance of the Picts, and I am afraid that the author disappoints here as well; his theory that the Scots, already inter-mixed with the Picts but presumably far less numerous, were somehow spared the ravages of the Vikings, and thus able to take over, is unconvincing, but more importantly, seems untestable. I found his thesis that the descendants of Alpin (including the famous Kenneth) were Picts interesting, until faced with the inconvenient evidence of their reappearance as Scots Kings at the end of the 9th century! As a non-expert, this book has not helped me to understand the reluctance to accept a Scottish conquest, in alliance with strong Viking (Norse) war-bands, followed by a carve-up of conquered territory, and yes, by genocide.

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a good attempt given the relatively sparse evidence 14 Feb 2012

By Legal Vampire

Format:Paperback

Given the very limited quantity, scope and reliability of surviving records from the area that became Scotland from the late eighth to the eleventh centuries AD, it is probably impossible to write a history of that time that answers the questions that most intersted people today would like to ask.

However, `From Pictland to Alba' is a good attempt, given these serious limitations within the author had to work.

The regions of Northern Britain that were to become `Scotland' were then backward even by Dark Age standards.

They had no towns and produced no coinage. At the beginning of this period it is doubtful they even had villages. There were just individual farms, inhabited by a family, plus their slaves if they owned any. Kings and bishops lived on big farms. The largest communities were abbeys and monasteries.

Modern borders had no particular significance. Some kingdoms at times straddled the Irish Sea, having territory in both Britain and Ireland, others included land on both sides of the modern border between Scotland and England.

For much of this period, apart from the Latin of the Church, as many as 5 different languages were spoken, each associated with one or more kingdoms or states that were sometimes independent.

- PICTISH (probably related to Welsh but a separate language) of which no significant writings survive, spoken extensively, at least in the earlier part of the period, in North-East Scotland and probably Orkney & Shetland. The language died out at some unknown date after the once powerful Pictish kingdom fell under Scots rule in the ninth century

-A form of WELSH, referred to as `BRITISH' or `CUMBRIC', the main language of the Kingdom of Strathclyde that included both South West Scotland and modern English Cumbria. This also died out at an unknown date following absorption of their kingdom by the Gaelic speaking Scots, seemingly by violent conquest in the eleventh century. Contemporary records say almost nothing about the Scots absorption of Strathclyde, perhaps because it happened at about the same time as the Norman Conquest of England in 1066, which dominated the attention of contemporary Chroniclers.

-NORSE brought by Scandinavians, which language may have dominated the North of Scotland and Western Isles for a time, although it was eventually to be supplanted by Gaelic. However, we have very little record of what was going on in the North of mainland Scotland at this time.

-ENGLISH in South-East Scotland, which was then often part of the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Northumbria

-GAELIC, at first indistinguishable from the language spoken in Ireland, starting in the West and spreading east and south. Its speakers formed a kingdom that came to be known variously as Alba, `Albania' (no relation to the Balkan country of that name) or Scottia. This kingdom eventually conquered all rivals to become the nucleus of what we now call `Scotland'.

Accordingly as the author would doubtless admit, especially in the earlier part of the period in calling this `Scottish' history and bringing together in one book the stories of the regions now collectively known as `Scotland' is to see the period from a modern perspective that would not necessarily make sense to people at the time.

Perhaps if the result of one or two obscure battles had been different the lands North of the Firth of Forth might today be known as Pictland or Norseland, and be a separate country or countries with their own language(s). Glasgow might be Welsh-speaking and Edinburgh might be part of England, or part of an independent kingdom of Northumbria with its capital in York or Bamburgh. There might be neither country nor even geographical concept coinciding with `Scotland' as we know it.

Whether, if that were so, e.g. anything like the British Empire would ever have existed, and whether North Americans or Australians would speak English today, is impossible to say.

Much must therefore have happened in this period of great importance in the making not just of Britain but of the world we know today.

I would love to know e.g. what Pictish may have sounded like when spoken, what songs and poems were lost and even what puns ceased to be funny when the language died; and whether Strathclyde Welsh and its probable cousin Pictish just vanished without trace from everyday speech or whether (as the author tentatively speculates) they may have influenced the syntax of Scots Gaelic, and when and why people stopped speaking them.

We have some surviving Medieval Chronicles but their authors were not concerned with these questions. The Chronicles are mostly annals tersely recording the names and dates of kings and battles with little `colour' or analysis. Like an old-fashioned Victorian school history book, they list the dates of many battles but almost never tell us why or how they were fought.

These Chronicles sometimes contradict each other, and were mostly either written in later periods or were written in and primarily concerned with Ireland or England, and only mention North British affairs in passing.

More lively are Icelandic Sagas that sometimes recount the deeds of Vikings in Britain and Ireland, but these are works of legend and literature, written down centuries after the events they describe, not reliable historical record.

The author admits that it is effectively impossible to write the social history of Scotland in this period except by referring to what we know of life and society in Ireland, England and elsewhere at the time, and assuming that life and society in Scotland may have been similar. However, the very fact that early Medieval Scotland produced far fewer written records than the rest of the British Isles suggests that its society was significantly different.

Doing his best with what he has, the author puts speculative skin on the bare bones of the surviving Chronicles. If all that is recorded of a king is that he was murdered at a particular place in a particular year, the author will speculate from that who might have wanted him killed and why. Quite often, the evidence is so sparse that I wonder if the speculation is useful. At times the almost endless series of largely forgotten kings and battles, of most of which we frankly know little of interest, becomes tedious.

The author calls characters by the names used in his primary sources, so for example Norsemen who in their own tongue called themselves Olafr (modern Olaf) become `Amlaib' after the Irish/ Gaelic way of writing their names.

Overall, the author has done a good job with what he has.

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5 of 6 people found the following review helpful

Excellent and insightful 31 Aug 2010

By Ms. M. M. Toledo-candelaria

Like the previous reviewer, I find that this book is an invaluable tool for those of us interested in Scottish medieval history. Woolf's approach is open-minded, he gives also his own theories regarding many of the events found in Scottish history, even though I may not agree with all of them. It is refreshing to find someone who does not regard Scottish kings before Malcolm III as 'barbarians', as Barrow so effortlessly call them. Woolf exposes the facts and permits the reader form his own opinion based on the evidence available. He easily engages outside of Scottish history to see how other peoples influence Alba and vice versa. Unlike many English historical narratives that exclude any other of the kingdoms that comprise Great Britain, Woolf proves how intertwined Scottish history is to the rest of Europe and the rest of Britain.