The historic peoples and kingdoms of Atlantic Scotland - the Picts, the Scots and the Norse - have their roots in the prehistory of the region. Concentrating on the Later Iron Age, this volume contains essays by archaeologists who summarize their recent research from specific sites in western Scotland, and who link the available material evidence with the later historically documented kingdoms and power structures of the Picts and the Vikings. They discuss questions of regional diversity and development, aspects of the material culture, and also re-evaluate the period as a whole. Traditional structural typological and diffusionist methods are abandoned in favour of new models of development and change.
Changing perspectives in the Atlantic Iron Age, Dennis W.Harding;
surveying the foundations - life after brochs, John W.Hedges; new insights
into Later Iron Age settlement in the north, Beverley Smith; brochs and
beyond in the Western Isles, Ian Armit; survey and excavation in West Lewis,
Dennis W.Harding; Hebridean pottery - problems of definition, chronology,
presence and absence, Alan Lane; fortifications in Argyll - retrospect and
future prospect, Margaret R.Nieke; pins, combs and the chronology of Later
Atlantic Iron Age settlement, Sally M.Foster; Pool, Sanday - a case study for
the Later Iron Age and Viking periods, John R.Hunter; the Atlantic Scottish
Iron Age, Ian Armit.
