The development of the Pictish symbol system : inscribing identity beyond the edges of Empire

The origins and evolution of writing was one of the most critical developments in world history, with a range of dramatic transformations in human society ascribed to literacy (Innes 1998: 3). Writing can instigate a revolution in the forms and possibilities of communication and has been directly linked to state formation in many social contexts and time periods across the world (Baines 1995: 471; Goody 1968: 4; Papdopoulos 2016: 1252; Postgate et al. 1995: 459). In northern Europe the alphabetic systems of the Greeks and Etruscan and Roman derivatives in the west inspired new forms of writing with vernacular scripts developing on the fringes of the Roman Empire in the first millennium AD. These included the runic system of Scandinavia and north Germany and the ogham alphabet of Ireland and western Britain (e.g. Barnes 2012; Findell 2014; Swift 1997). Both of these scripts were used across early medieval Britain and Ireland, but the most common and monumental form of communication that survives from northern Britain is the lesser understood Pictish symbol system. Strong arguments have been made in recent years for the symbol system being a script, albeit un-deciphered (Samson 1992; Forsyth 1997; Lee et al. 2010). Debates on its origins and dating have taken place for over a century and this article outlines a new programme of radiocarbon dating and Bayesian modelling on a range of new sites and objects that have produced a new and more robust chronology for the development of the symbol system, with an earlier origin proposed than many scholars had previously countenanced.