Pagan Symbols Of The Picts

Stuart McHardy examines the Pictish symbols which have been discovered on various items across Scotland. The book sets out a cohesive interpretation of the Pictish past, using a variety of both temporal and geographical sources. This interpretation serves as a backdrop for his analysis of the symbols themselves, providing a context for his suggestion that there was an underlying series of ideas and beliefs behind the creation of the symbols.

Few problems in British history have proved as intractable as that of the origin and ethnic associations of the Picts. For although we may find numerous references to them within Roman and Celtic sources they have left us no historical texts of their own. So often we find the early Picts mentioned within histories of Roman Britain as mere opponents of Roman arms -- but who these tattooed barbarians were remains a mystery. First published in hardback 1998 now also available in Kindle hard and soft editions Modern opinion holds that the Picts were Celts, like the Scots and Welsh. This book seeks to demonstrate the scarcity of evidence for this common assumption and follows instead the evidence of native tradition. In a stimulating new study the author offers a view of the Picts that is certainly not the current text book standard. It concentrates on the very oldest traditions of Pictish origins, which together with early historical sources, would suggest that the Picts were not Celts at all, but ‘Scythians’. It will put an alternative case that the Picts were Finno-Ugrian immigrants from the Baltic coast. The author provides an investigation which subjects the traditions of Pictish origin to thorough scrutiny and by offering a viewpoint that does not commence from a Celtic bias, thereby offers some new ideas on a much neglected subject.

Smitten by Scotland since childhood, travel writer Rebecca Gibson moved to Moray and started exploring her new home region on foot to produce this new title in Bradt’s award-winning series of Slow travel guides to UK regions. Walkers, cyclists, wildlife lovers, families, history and folklore enthusiasts, and foodies are all catered for, with coverage of a wide range of attractions. As the only comprehensive guidebook to North East Scotland in print, it also contains all the practical information you could need to plan and enjoy time in this thrillingly diverse yet largely under-explored part of Britain. This region of mountains and coasts, ancient Caledonian pine forests and salmon-rich rivers harbours much to enthral and surprise. Long famous among hillwalkers, mountaineers and nature lovers, the Cairngorms is the UK’s largest National Park and holds five of its six tallest summits – but also abounds in fairy folklore. Balmoral Estate has been a royal residence since Queen Victoria’s reign, while Aberdeenshire – with its unique language, Doric – has Scotland’s highest density of castles and numerous Pictish stone circles among an astounding 30,000 sites of historical and archaeological interest. Between Inverness and Aberdeen lies the less-familiar region of Moray, which hosts the world’s most northerly population of bottle-nosed dolphins, Scotland’s oldest independent museum, and Forres, where Shakespeare’s Macbeth met the three witches. Here the Scots language and culture are celebrated through gatherings such as fire festivals. This guidebook’s Slow approach to travel fits with a growing ethos of sustainability in this part of Scotland, from Findhorn Ecovillage to a celebration of locally sourced, artisan and organic food alongside the well-known products of whisky, Aberdeen Angus beef and River Dee salmon. Key heritage attractions are described in intimate detail – but so too are opportunities to see some of Scotland’s most special wildlife, from pinewood-dwelling crested tits to high-altitude specialists like ptarmigan. Whether you are keen to visit castles or indulge in whisky-tastings amid Britain’s highest concentration of distilleries, to hike among Cairngorm’s remote mountains or to stride boldly along miles upon miles of coastline, discover North East Scotland with Bradt’s unique Slow guide.

A guide to the basic symbolism of the Celtic Cross, featuring rare illustrations. Did you know that the basic symbolism of the cross is that of the world axis, or the link between Heaven and Earth? Or that the main feature of the ornamented Celtic Cross, the wheel cross, is not derived from the crucifixion, but from a more ancient symbol the Chi-Rho monogram, which is the name of Christ in the Greek alphabet? In Symbolism of the Celtic Cross, Derek Bryce traces the pagan-Christian link of the essential symbolism of the axis mundi from standing stones and market crosses (at crossroads and not always “crosses” in form) to the inscribed slabs and freestanding crosses of the Celtic-Christian era. He includes rare illustrations of ornamental Celtic Crosses from such places as Brittany, Wales, Scotland, the Isle of Man, Cumbria, Ireland, and Cornwall. Bryce explores esoteric aspects of the symbolism, alchemy, and the wisdom of Hermes.

This index identifies some 1,000 female characters who appear in novels, short stories, and plays about the American South. All of the major and some of the minor characters created by the most distinguished Southern writers are included. (Authors who wrote about the South but who were not born or raised there are excluded.) All characters are listed alphabetically, followed by a short description of their character traits and/or role. This is followed by the work(s) of literature in which the character appears and the author's name. Sweeney's introduction includes an explanation of the scope, organization, and rationale of the work. Also covered are the depictions of women by Southern writers, including stereotypical patterns, racial differences, regional diversity, and developmental progress or changes in portraiture. Following the index is an appendix listing fifteen categories of Southern female characters. The labels for these categories are drawn from the literature itself. Author and title indexes conclude the work.

Whether as the mothers of the Norse God Heimdall, Morgan and her sisters on Avalon, the nine sisters at the heart of the founding myth of the Gikuyu of Kenya, or witches battling with the Irish St Patrick, stories of nine women, often attending a goddess or linked to a heroic or divine male, exist across much of our world. Triggered by a local story still told in his native Dundee, Stuart McHardy has traced what seems to be memories of groups of nine women, most likely some kind of priestesses, across much of Europe and as far as Siberia, Korea, India and Africa. Whether as Pictish saints, Muses, Valkyries, Druidesses or witches, the tales of these groups of nine women transcend a vast range of cultural and linguistic boundaries. The painting of nine women dancing round a priapic male in a Catalonian cave painting over fifteen thousand years old suggests these groups may well have been one of the oldest cultural institutions humanity has known.