The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
The making of a capital city
Ryan Campbell is celebrating Scotland’s newest city by chronicling Fife’s history.
After looking at Pictish influence on this page yesterday, the China-based writer today turns to pivotal events in the establishing of the kingdom’s ancient capital, Dunfermline.
Ryan tells us: “Shortly after the Picts regained the Kingdom of Fib (later Fife), they mysteriously disappeared from the accounts of history. Most likely, the warring factions of Gaels and Picts merged with each other to form the Kingdom of Alba.
“It is believed that a King Kenneth MacAlpin inherited the Kingdom of the Picts from his mother, at the same time inheriting the Gaelic Kingdom of Dál Riada from his father. Consequently, he became the very first monarch of the Kingdom of Alba, uniting the Gaels and Picts.
“The circumstances in which Alba was born are shrouded in mystery, but there is no debate about the Picts’ heavy influence from their throne in the Kingdom of Fife, which came to contain 14 of Scotland’s 66 royal burghs, with Dunfermline once serving as the country’s capital city.
“Its first settlements are thought to predate even the Picts, with some believed to date back thousands of years to the Neolithic era. From then on, evidence exists of both Pictish and Gaelic influence.
“Demonstrating this, many town names are thought to be derived from both language systems. Dunfermline comes from the lost-in-time Gaelic of Dùn Phàrlain.
“Whilst the first element of the name, ‘Dùn’, is traceable, the origins of the rest are debated, suggesting it could have come from either the lost language of the Picts or
ancient Gaelic, or a combination of both.
“In 570 AD, Dunfermline made its first official entry into the history books as a centre for the Culdee monks of that period. Scholars have argued that the Culdees were established in the 2nd Century AD and were later restored by Ireland’s St Patrick in the 5th Century AD, adding further mythos to an already spellbinding territory.
“The monks continued their practice for hundreds of years at a church location
known today as Dunfermline Abbey. In a romantic effort to unite their kingdoms, King Malcolm III of Scotland and Saint Margaret, Princess of England, married in 1070 AD at the crown jewel abbey, and Dunfermline was first recognised as a city.
“Though the seed of royal assent had been planted by their wedding, Dunfermline Abbey did not receive its official status until the monarchs invited the Benedictine monks of Canterbury to grace it so in 1072.
“Queen Margaret’s pious Christianity then led her to set up a ferry route for the passage of monks across the Firth of Forth, establishing the towns of North and South Queensferry on their respective ends of the water. The route continues to be used today, almost 1,000 years after being established.
“King Malcolm III, along with his eldest son, Edward, was killed in 1093 at the Battle of Alnwick, as the centuries-long war continued. Three days later, Queen Margaret reportedly died of grief at Edinburgh Castle.
“Whilst their life together was short-lived, Scotland’s king and queen were laid to rest at the abbey where they had both married and founded a lasting gift to their country.”