In the two decades since James Graham-Campbell and Colleen Batey published Vikings in Scotland: An Archaeological Survey, a tremendous amount of research and publication has taken place. The twentieth anniversary of the book offered an excellent opportunity to provide an update in light of the countless excavations, scientific advances, historical and place-name studies and postgraduate theses that had been produced since 1998. This was partly inspired by a day conference held in honour of Barbara Crawford in 2007 (Woolf 2009) to celebrate twenty years since the publication of Scandinavian Scotland (Crawford 1987). The resulting Vikings in Scotland: 20 Years On conference was held in December 2018 at the University of Glasgow. Scholars from around the UK and abroad shared their latest research on the Viking Age in Scotland, and the papers in this book are a result of that conference.

The format of this volume is different from James and Colleen’s book in that each chapter is a separate paper authored by a conference speaker. Rather than feature a few select papers, the editors of this volume opted to include as many papers as possible from the conference to cover as much ground as one volume can. As a result, the papers in this volume are slightly shorter than in many volumes, and short chapters on specific sites are meant to illustrate wider concepts discussed in the volume. Many excellent monographs and reports about these sites that have been produced or are nearing publication can provide more detailed information.

The keynote speaker from our conference, Judith Jesch, begins this volume with a tribute to Colleen. Subsequently, Olwyn Owen provides an historical overview paying homage to a key strength of Vikings in Scotland, namely an accessible overview of the recent research on Viking-Age Scotland. Thereafter, the book follows thematic sections which begin with first contacts and Norse settlement in ‘Arrival of the Vikings and Native–Norse Interactions’, ‘Scandinavian Settlement’ and ‘Place-names: Interactions with the Landscape’, then to ‘Environmental Impact and Land Use’. The updated research continues with sections on ‘Power and the Political Landscape’ and ‘Economy and Exchange’.

Vikings in Scotland’s interdisciplinary strength is particularly apparent in its incorporation of linguistics, such as documentary evidence and place-names, which it noted were ‘of the greatest value’, despite the then-uneven research foci (1998: 37). That said, Graham-Campbell and Batey advised caution in attempting to make hard and fast assumptions about sequences of settlement from this evidence, something especially true for the Hebrides.

Since at least the 19th century (Macniven, this section), scholars have attempted to understand Scandinavian settlement in the Hebrides amid the fog of a post-Viking-Age resurgence and northern expansion of Gaelic over areas with an Old Norse (ON)-speaking interlude. Key questions centre on the linguistic border of Gaelic and Pictish before ON speakers settled (as is generally considered) in the first half of the 9th century; how extensive the settlement of ON speakers was; and whether this settlement weakened from the northern and western (particularly the Western Isles and Skye) to the southern and eastern Hebrides, creating distinct north-western and south-eastern sociolinguistic regions.

Where Vikings in Scotland described the then-accepted model of this north to south (and Outer to Inner Hebrides) change (1998: 41, 72), Macniven (this section) suggests we rethink assumptions about weak(er) landnam in the southern Hebrides, and on Islay in particular: given prominent ON nature generics (like dalr), the survival of ON place-names on prime land throughout Islay and the virtual absence of a pre-ON onomastic stratum, Macniven argues that ‘the initial impact of Viking settlement in the south was very similar to that in the north. The defining difference was what happened next’.

Taking a somewhat different tack, Clancy (this section) describes the Hebridean church encountered by the Vikings as inhabiting a ‘particular sociolinguistic domain’ that provided a measure of continuity into the Viking Age and beyond, expanding upon ideas expressed in Vikings in Scotland (1998: 39) about the survival of indigenous communities potentially helping to maintain Celtic Christianity, languages and placenames. For Clancy, Gaelic was considered by all communities as a highstatus language due to its links to the Christianity Scandinavians in the Hebrides were adopting (potentially as early as the initial landnam), with some island names indicating early Scandinavian settlers added Gaelic saints to their pantheon.

An explosion of new information made available by an increase in archaeological excavations and environmental recovery techniques in the 1970s and ‘80s led Graham-Campbell and Batey to describe the picture of Viking and Late Norse period settlement in 1998 as ‘altered radically’ (1998: 155). Vikings in Scotland appeared just as many of these excavations were coming to fruition, and a greater awareness of the complexities in building techniques, economic activity and settlement distribution was beginning to be appreciated. Exploration of multiperiod sites, and the identification of earlier, Viking-Age, as well as Late Norse, houses was showing that the Vikings often colonised existing settlement sites and that their buildings did not always conform to the later, bow-sided longhouses seen at Jarlshof and other such ‘type sites’.

Twenty years later, many more newly excavated and reassessed settlement sites have come to publication, including those reported on in this volume. This has been matched by an increase in Norse place-name studies, and both have resulted in new interpretations of Scandinavian settlement and the forms it took (see also Part III).

The papers in this section aptly demonstrate the complexity of Scandinavian settlement between areas and centuries. At Bornais in South Uist in the Western Isles (Sharples, this section), the exceptional quality of preservation seen in the excavation of three high-status houses spanning the late 9th to early 14th centuries has enabled a study of the social position of female slaves through artefact distributions and building layout on the site. To the north, in Unst, Shetland, where a uniquely high number of longhouses have been identified through survey, the excavations at Hamar and Underhoull (Bond and Dockrill, this section), have revealed that a longer, and far more complex, settlement history is present than previously thought. In contrast, the excavation of the remains of a farm founded in the 10th century at Machair Bharabhais, Lewis, discovered that it was abandoned by the end of the 13th century at a time of great political turmoil in the Hebrides (MacLeod Rivett and Cowie, this section).

New scientific techniques are aiding greatly in the study of the spread of Scandinavian settlement since Vikings in Scotland and highlight the differences between different areas.

When Scandinavians arrived in Scotland, they brought with them subsistence practices from their homelands: animal husbandry, dairying, grain cultivation, an infield-outfield system and the intensified exploitation of marine resources (for example, Barrett and Richards 2017), and their impacts on the environment can be seen in the botanical and faunal material. These include the probable introduction of flax cultivation in Orkney (Bond and Hunter 1987), the practice of manuring crops and possibly hunting red deer to extinction in the Western Isles (Jones, this section). However, much of this evidence was previously overlooked; Graham-Campbell and Batey (1998: 50) noted that the original Jarlshof excavation publication (Hamilton 1956) had devoted only one page to environmental evidence, whereas by the late 1990s it was routine to recover environmental samples during excavation.

Since 1998, further developments in stable isotope analysis and aDNA, plus new approaches to studying older collections from sites such as Earl’s Bu (Orphir, Orkney), are allowing researchers to learn not just which species were present on a site, but how they were used and the social implications of that management (see Jones and Mainland, both this section). Food production is now seen as part of a more complex social system which included gifting and displays of wealth, such as feasts hosted by the local Earls. Although attested to in written sources such as the Orkneyinga Saga, feasting is now convincingly identified in the archaeological record in Viking-Age Scotland, with evidence for the slaughter of animals for meat at a prime age and large-scale consumption causing farms to become increasingly specialised in the Late Norse period.

Scandinavians would have had to adapt their farming practices to suit the landscapes and soils of Scotland, and it appears that cultural contact between Scandinavians and native groups took place on the farm. Cattle were important to all groups during the Viking Age. Foster (this section) argues that the separation of milk cows from other cattle in shielings rather than grazing them all together, may have been a practice learnt by the Norse from the native inhabitants, as seen in the place-name elements of Gaelic ærgi and Old Norse sætr.

The historical sources for the start of the Viking Age in Scotland are sparse at best and comprise only occasional mentions of raids in the Irish historical sources. The resulting view that violent Viking raids or invasions occurred around 800, which were then followed by land-taking (landnam) and settlement, dominated archaeological thought at the time of the publication of Vikings in Scotland, although this was starting to change (Griffiths, this section). The Scandinavian arrivals could be identified in the archaeological record, particularly in the Northern and Western Isles of Scotland, with pagan graves furnished with weapons, grave goods and sometimes boats or horses, bowed longhouses, and an increased use of steatite vessels and the expansion of fishing. However, there was still a lot to be learnt about the nature of the initial contact between the native populations in Scotland of Picts, Gaels, Angles and Britons, and about the processes by which this transitioned to landtaking, naming and settlement (Graham-Campbell and Batey 1998: 23–4, 54, 72–4, 93–5).

Both leading up to the publication of Vikings in Scotland and beyond, arguments have ranged from total genocide of the native populations on the one hand, to peaceful coexistence within an incoming, but ultimately dominating, Scandinavian culture on the other (see Barrett 2008). The research included in this section demonstrates that the situation is far more nuanced than has always been appreciated. Norse impact varied among different areas, and the increasing recognition of continuity and change in the archaeological record demonstrates that the reality of native–Norse interaction was complex, something also mirrored in place-name studies (Macniven, Whyte and Clancy, all this volume).

As Griffiths illustrates, there is a noted gap in radiocarbon dates from northern and western Scotland spanning the likely period of first Viking arrivals to the later 10th century, whereas evidence for architecture and landscape use is clearly identifiable as Scandinavian. He suggests this may be the result of an intermediate period of transition, which Dockrill and Bond (this section) have also identified at Old Scatness, Shetland and suggest that this process was complex and continued for some time.

The relationship between the native population and the incoming Norse has been one of the most contentious aspects of Viking-Age archaeology in Scotland over the last fifty years, with scholarship travelling back and forth between the two extremes of violent annihilation and peaceful assimilation, visiting various positions in between (see, for example, Morris 1998; Backlund 2001; Barrett 2003; Smith 2003). The archaeology at St Ninian’s Isle has an important contribution to make to the debate, not least in suggesting that the picture is far more intricate than the two extremes would suggest.

St Ninian’s Isle is a small island joined by a sandy tombolo (Figure 4.1) to the west coast of Dunrossness in south mainland Shetland (Figure 4.2). It is most well known for a hoard of Pictish silverware found in 1958 during excavations on the island led by Andrew O’Dell between 1955 and 1959, when his team excavated a myriad of Iron-Age to late medieval archaeological features from beneath up to 6m of windblown sand. Although short annual accounts and articles concerning the treasure were produced, the site was not published until 1973 by Alan Small, who had supervised there as a student (Small et al. 1973). Very little in the way of site records could be located, and the resulting volume unavoidably dealt primarily with the hoard; the account of the excavations themselves comprised only four pages, a plan and selected finds drawings, with Charles Thomas adding his own thoughts and a plan in relation to the sculptured stones (Thomas 1973). All that was known of a Viking-Age presence was the suggestion that the hoard had been buried in the floor of an early chapel on the site in the face of Viking raids around 800, and that four steatite cross-stones and a small hogback were found in the 1950s in the windblown sand that covered the site, with no record of their provenance (Thomas 1973: 13). References to St Ninian’s Isle in Viking surveys have, as a result, had to concentrate on these tantalising morsels of information (Graham-Campbell and Batey 1998: 9, 14, 65, 227; also, for example, Crawford 1987: 128, 131, 159, 166; Morris 1990 (1994): 816–17).

As Vikings in Scotland understood, most Scotto-Scandinavians probably experienced everyday life through the prism of local and/or regional subsistence economies. For elites, environmental evidence highlights the importance of farming and fishing surpluses for redistribution and feasting strategies, which were in turn used as a social and political mechanism for influence and loyalty (see Part V).

Beyond the local, assemblages and hoards suggest some Scotto- Scandinavians also had access, at least intermittently, to ‘exotic’ longdistance market networks and the precious metals used as money within them. Unlike the coin-based economies of England, though, the limited commercial transactions that did occur in Scotland were more commonly facilitated with a bullion (metal-weight) currency popular in Scandinavia and parts of the Danelaw. These economies saw silver, and less frequently gold, used as cash based on weight and purity. Here, silver ornament (commonly arm-rings), ingots and coins were regularly fragmented into ‘hack-silver’ to make smaller denominations, being weighed in balances using specialised weights of the sort discovered on Colonsay and Gigha (Horne, this section).

As Graham-Campbell and Batey discussed, the region’s natural wealth would have created surpluses that underpinned and financed this exotic, if likely rare, form of market-based activity (1998: 226). Over time, elites developed increasingly sophisticated and presumably lucrative trade, such as the exchange of timber or combs (Ashby, this section), perhaps traded directly for fish or textiles, or bought using such products as a form of cash known as ‘commodity money’.

Although no permanent Scotto-Scandinavian market has been discovered outwith Whithorn (Galloway), temporary beach and thing markets (Sanmark, this volume) may have been held in both the north and west, perhaps explaining concentrations of burials around a natural harbour like Pierowall, Orkney. In any case, wealth was certainly entering Scotland, whatever the underlying mechanism: the Galloway Hoard, deposited around 900, contains a remarkable volume of silver ingots and Hiberno-Scandinavian arm-rings alongside artefacts derived from trade routes stretching to Central Asia, attesting to the potential liquidity of at least some settlers and their membership of wider exchange networks (Goldberg, this section).

As outlined above, precious metals used as bullion were likely gained via selling surplus natural resources, combined with shipping tolls and piracy, bringing the wealth seen in thirty-six hoards (Graham-Campbell, this section).

In Vikings in Scotland, Graham-Campbell and Batey introduced the reader not only to the impact of landnam and settlement on the landscape and power dynamics operating within Scandinavian Scotland (Parts I and II, this volume), but also to research on the subsequent development of thing (assembly) sites and architecturally impressive elite power centres, that was then at completed or near-complete publication.

Scandinavian thing-sites, where religious debates and legal rulings (and possibly markets: see Sanmark, this section) were held, are preserved in today’s place-names such as Tingwall (Orkney and Shetland) and Dingwall (Ross). Over two decades on, Sanmark adds to their importance beyond the administrative role presumed in the 1990s by articulating how a thing also provided a widely accessible arena in the regional landscape for the negotiation of power relations between elites and their community.

Sanmark also explores the regionally specific evolution of thing-sites. Scotto-Scandinavian elites, for example, responded to a unique colonial environment in the North Atlantic that, unlike Iceland, for example, contained ancient indigenous mound monuments like barrows and overgrown brochs. Scandinavians in Scotland behaved like elites in the homelands in their use of these venerable mounds to legitimise an ‘ancient’ right to rule that was rooted in the landscape.

Domination of both the pre-existing and contemporary landscape is also apparent in the site location and wealth demonstrated at the Brough of Birsay, an influential Pictish site that became ‘the power centre of the Viking Earldom of Orkney’ (Morris, this section) and an important church site. Indeed, as Vikings in Scotland demonstrated, the story of Orcadian power evolution and its landscape impact is one of the increasing importance of Christianity.

Beyond church power, secular control in Orkney and the Northern Isles pivoted increasingly to the Norwegian kingdom as the Viking Age moved into the Late Norse period. At the same time, however, regional elites like the Orkney Earls could increase their wealth from the evermore efficient exploitation of natural resources; this seems to have been the case within Orkney at the Earl’s Bu, Orphir with its elite bu placename, sophisticated watermill, and important manufacturing complex at nearby Lavacroon (Batey, this section).

Perhaps one of the most enduring images in Viking studies is that of pagan burials, especially those containing swords, boats or horses. These graves allow us some understanding of Viking beliefs of the afterlife prior to Christianity and give us an intimate look at both the lives and deaths of individuals. Antiquarians discovered many Viking graves in the 18th and 19th centuries, but these tended to be poorly published (if at all) and only the ‘interesting’ parts of the burial, such as the weapons, were kept, and often subsequently lost. Later publications were also often riddled with errors and omissions that were perpetuated in modern academic works.

Vikings in Scotland gave a comprehensive overview of Scottish Viking burials known in the late 1990s, including questioning aspects of older interpretations of some burials such as Kiloran Bay, Colonsay. A long-term initiative called the Pagan Norse Graves of Scotland Project (Graham-Campbell et al., this section) has since sought to reassess known graves and artefacts by tracing the original written records documenting these finds to rectify any mistakes in interpretation. The result is a drastic increase in the number of known Viking graves, as well as the reinterpretation of artefacts and new insights into the origins and practices of the Norse buried here.

In addition to reassessing old finds, there have been a number of new burials found in recent years due to large-scale excavations, commercial projects and rescue digs on eroding shorelines, perhaps most notably the boat burial containing a man, woman and child at Scar, Sanday, Orkney (Owen and Dalland 1999). One highly publicised recent discovery was a boat burial found at Swordle Bay on the Ardnamurchan peninsula in Argyll in 2011 (Batey, this section). Although much was made in the popular press of this being the first Viking boat burial found on mainland Britain, its placement overlooking waters off the western coast of Scotland puts it firmly on the sailing route between the Irish Sea and North Sea areas, and it is similar to other nearby burials in the Western Isles.

A more surprising recent find is a cemetery used for centuries along the shores of Loch Lomond, a region traditionally considered outwith areas of Scandinavian settlement (Batey, also this section).