Royalty and Ritual. The landscape of power in early medieval Scotland and Europe

Edited by Alexandra Sanmark, Mark A. Hall, Jane Geddes & Oisín Plumb

Royalty and Ritual

The landscape of power in early medieval Scotland and Europe

Edited by Alexandra Sanmark, Mark A. Hall, Jane Geddes & Oisín Plumb | Forthcoming

Publication date: 07-05-2026

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Bookinfo

Paperback ISBN: 9789464271539 | Hardback ISBN: 9789464271546 | Imprint: Sidestone Press | Format: 210x280mm | ca. 200 pp. | Language: English | 23 illus. (bw) | 54 illus. (fc) | Keywords: kingship; early medieval Scotland; sacrality; folklore; Europe | download cover | DOI: 10.59641/p0s6m7n8o9 | CC-license: CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

Publication date: 07-05-2026

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Abstract
Contents
About the author/editor

Medieval kings and kingship, and the rituals that define them, continue to captivate both scholars and the wider public. This interdisciplinary volume offers a Europe-wide perspective on early medieval kingship, with a particular focus on Scotland.
What types of royal sites existed in the early medieval period in Scotland, and how did they vary regionally? Can we trace these sites in placenames? What rituals and other activities were associated with these sites, and what purposes did they serve? These and other questions are explored in the papers gathered together in this interdisciplinary volume.

Drawing together experts in archaeology, history, placenames, folklore, poetry, and art history, the volume unpacks the story of early medieval kingship in Scotland against a European backdrop and across multiple scales, from multi-site regions and the mobile exercise of kingship, to single-site landscapes, analysis of significant objects, and the memorialisation of stories through tradition.

Framed by recent archaeological excavations in Scotland, Wales, Ireland, England, and Scandinavia, this book presents a rich and innovative approach to the study of kingship in the early medieval period.

Introduction
Mark A. Hall, Alexandra Sanmark, Jane Geddes and Oisín Plumb

I: Scotland from pagan rulers to Christian kings

Powerful Place(s): elite power and the central place complexes of early medieval northern Britain
Gordon Noble

Identifying the development of local power centres in Pictland and Alba
Nick Evans

Lords of The Dance: materialising sacral leadership in early medieval Scotland
Mark A. Hall

The St Andrews Sarcophagus: shrine for an anointed king?
Jane Geddes

Characterising early medieval Royal Sites: Scotland in an Insular context
Ewan Campbell

Kings’ feet or the marks of angels? Footprints in stone revisited
Thomas Owen Clancy

Memories of Pictish secular power in places of Christian ritual
Oisín Plumb

II: Aspects of kingship in Scotland’s Insular and European neighbours

Fæsted-Harreby-Sønder Hygum: a power centre in southern Jutland
Lars Grundvad

Kings’ Seats or Royal Residences? Thoughts about Scandinavian ‘central places’
Jan-Henrik Fallgren

Local communities and the rise of polities in the Tyne-Forth region (c 400–850 AD)
Celia Orsini

The visual prominence and accessibility of the early medieval great hall complex at Yeavering, Northumberland, England
Brian Buchanan, Sarah Semple, Tudor Skinner

Royal nunneries as centres of power: a comparison of Anglo-Saxon and Pictish evidence
Barbara Yorke

The importance of St Michael’s Workington within the 10th-century Hiberno-Scandinavian polity
Caroline Paterson

Kings on the move: the case of the Viking Great Army
Shane McLeod

Origins of the Tøglag metre and the royal power rituals at the court of Knútr inn Ríki
Jakub Morawiec

Royal uses of ‘Sites of Memory’ in the Viking Age and modern Norway
Karl Christian Alvestad and Anne Irene Riisøy

The Stone of Scone
David H. Caldwell

Royal power and folklore in early medieval Wales and the microcosm of Llangorse
Mark Redknap

Prof. Dr Alexandra Sanmark

Alexandra Sanmark is Professor of Medieval Archaeology at the Institute for Northern Studies, University of the Highlands and Islands. Her research interests include Iron Age Scandinavia, in particular the Viking Age and the expansion into the North Atlantic. She also has a strong interest in Viking Age religion, law and assembly as well as the Christianisation of northwest Europe. She has recently led a number of research projects, such as the AHRC/DFG-funded The Norse and the Sea, which focuses on Viking Age settlement and maritime connections in Scotland and the Royal Society funded Communications in Norse Orkney.

Dr Mark A. Hall

Dr Mark A Hall is an archaeologist and museum curator based at Perth Museum (Culture Perth & Kinross), Perth, Scotland. He has recently been the lead researcher for the new Perth Museum project, which opened in March 2024. His research interests principally span the medieval centuries from the Late Antique to the 16th century, with a focus on medieval material culture, including board and dice games, the cult of saints and supernatural engagement, cultural biography and re-imagining the Middle Ages. He has published widely and internationally in journals and books.

Prof. (em.) Dr Jane Geddes

Jane Geddes is emerita Professor of Art History from the University of Aberdeen. She specialises in medieval art of all media, and architectural history.

Dr Oisín Plumb

Oisín Plumb is a lecturer at the Institute for Northern Studies, University of the Highlands and Islands. His research focuses on Early medieval Northern Britain and Ireland. Particular issues of interest include the formation of local and national identities in the early medieval period as well as maps and the understanding of the earth’s lands in the Early Middle Ages.

Abstract:

Medieval kings and kingship, and the rituals that define them, continue to captivate both scholars and the wider public. This interdisciplinary volume offers a Europe-wide perspective on early medieval kingship, with a particular focus on Scotland.
What types of royal sites existed in the early medieval period in Scotland, and how did they vary regionally? Can we trace these sites in placenames? What rituals and other activities were associated with these sites, and what purposes did they serve? These and other questions are explored in the papers gathered together in this interdisciplinary volume.

Drawing together experts in archaeology, history, placenames, folklore, poetry, and art history, the volume unpacks the story of early medieval kingship in Scotland against a European backdrop and across multiple scales, from multi-site regions and the mobile exercise of kingship, to single-site landscapes, analysis of significant objects, and the memorialisation of stories through tradition.

Framed by recent archaeological excavations in Scotland, Wales, Ireland, England, and Scandinavia, this book presents a rich and innovative approach to the study of kingship in the early medieval period.

Prof. Dr Alexandra Sanmark

Alexandra Sanmark is Professor of Medieval Archaeology at the Institute for Northern Studies, University of the Highlands and Islands. Her research interests include Iron Age Scandinavia, in particular the Viking Age and the expansion into the North Atlantic. She also has a strong interest in Viking Age religion, law and assembly as well as the Christianisation of northwest Europe. She has recently led a number of research projects, such as the AHRC/DFG-funded The Norse and the Sea, which focuses on Viking Age settlement and maritime connections in Scotland and the Royal Society funded Communications in Norse Orkney.

Dr Mark A. Hall

Dr Mark A Hall is an archaeologist and museum curator based at Perth Museum (Culture Perth & Kinross), Perth, Scotland. He has recently been the lead researcher for the new Perth Museum project, which opened in March 2024. His research interests principally span the medieval centuries from the Late Antique to the 16th century, with a focus on medieval material culture, including board and dice games, the cult of saints and supernatural engagement, cultural biography and re-imagining the Middle Ages. He has published widely and internationally in journals and books.

Prof. (em.) Dr Jane Geddes

Jane Geddes is emerita Professor of Art History from the University of Aberdeen. She specialises in medieval art of all media, and architectural history.

Dr Oisín Plumb

Oisín Plumb is a lecturer at the Institute for Northern Studies, University of the Highlands and Islands. His research focuses on Early medieval Northern Britain and Ireland. Particular issues of interest include the formation of local and national identities in the early medieval period as well as maps and the understanding of the earth’s lands in the Early Middle Ages.

Similar books:

Royalty and Ritual

The landscape of power in early medieval Scotland and Europe

Edited by Alexandra Sanmark, Mark A. Hall, Jane Geddes & Oisín Plumb | Forthcoming

Royalty and Ritual

The landscape of power in early medieval Scotland and Europe

Edited by Alexandra Sanmark, Mark A. Hall, Jane Geddes & Oisín Plumb | Forthcoming

Publication date: 07-05-2026

Publication date: 07-05-2026

Prof. Dr Alexandra Sanmark

Dr Mark A. Hall

Prof. (em.) Dr Jane Geddes

Dr Oisín Plumb

Abstract:

Contents

Prof. Dr Alexandra Sanmark

Dr Mark A. Hall

Prof. (em.) Dr Jane Geddes

Dr Oisín Plumb

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