13 October 2016

The Highland Archaeology Festival takes place 1st-16th October, with the launch lecture by Richard Oram on 30th September. There are over 80 events, a museum trail, exhibitions,  workshops, and of course the annual conference, this year 15th & 16th October. See www.highlandarchaeologyfestival.org for full details.

13 October 2016

Underneath the Scottish Sahara: The Culbin Sands and Maritime Havens in Earlier Prehistoric Britain

A talk on excavations at Culbin Sands, Moray by Professor Richard Bradley of the University of Reading. Talk held at Williamson Hall, Duff Avenue, Elgin. £3 /£2 for members. Children welcome with adults. For visitors coming from afar, Elgin Museum will be open til 7pm.

Elgin Museum

Phone 01343 543675
Email curator@elginmuseum.org.uk

part of Highland Archaeology Festival

13 October 2016

Northern Picts: Fragments of Significance: Identifying high status settlement in northern Pictland

Talk by Daniel W. MacLean

Tarbat Discovery Centre, Portmahomack. Entry £3.

Sites like Rhynie and Portmahomack have provided spectacular insights into high status Northern Pictish settlement, yet other sites have proved more elusive to discover. This paper will look at the methodology behind identifying possible high status Pictish
settlement sites in the archaeological record.

The focus for the study was centred on the Beauly and Moray Firths, areas which have until recently suffered from a lack of archaeological study. Utilising three case studies it will
compare archaeological, cropmark, documentary and sculptural evidence at each site with the most recent scholarship to suggest the complex network of sites spanning prehistory to the eventual rise of the great Pictish kingdom of Fortriu.