Biggest ever Pictish ‘village’ found
● Archaeologists find evidence up to 4,000 people lived in over 800 huts
A spectacular hilltop in the North East has been revealed as the site of the largest known Pictish settlement following a “mindblowing” discovery by archaeologists.
Archaeologists from Aberdeen University have uncovered evidence that up to 4,000 people may have lived in more than 800 huts perched high on the Tap O’ Noth close to the village of Rhynie.
Radiocarbon dating suggests the fort – a settlement within a rampart which encloses an area of around 17 acres - was constructed in the 5th to 6th Century AD and that settlement on the hill may date back as far as the third century AD, meaning it is likely to be Pictish in origin.
Their discovery means that the area, which today is a quiet village home to just a few hundred people, once had a hilltop settlement that at its height may have rivalled the largest known post-roman settlements in Europe.
Professor Gordon Noble, who led the research, described the discovery through carbon dating that activity at the site extended into the Pictish period as the ‘most surprising of his career’.
“I was absolutely stunned when I read the results. “It is truly mind blowing and demonstrates just how much we still have to learn about settlement around the time that the early kingdoms of Pictland were being consolidated.”
Archaeologists have worked in the area for several years with its Pictish heritage long known given the famous Rhynie Man standing stone found on Barflat farm.
However, the hillfort overlooking it at the top of Tap O’ Noth had generally been assumed to date from the Bronze or Iron Age.
Professor Noble added: “We took samples from the site really just to begin placing the important discoveries we have made at Rhynie over the last few years in a broader geographical context. Because of the sheer scale of the fort and its location clinging to the side of a hill at the edges of the Cairngorms, some scholars had suggested occupation dated from a time when the climate was warmer, possibly during the Bronze age, and our earlier excavations have shown the vitrified fort on the summit of Tap O’ Noth dated to 400-100 BC.”
“The results of the dating were simply incredible. They show that the huge fort dated to the fifth to sixth centuries AD and that it was occupied at the same time as the elite complex in the valley at Barflat farm.”