The Battle of Dún Nechtain, A Rearguard Action in Defence of Dunnichen

The fact that Bridei and Ecgfrith were distantly related is a side-point in the discussion of the battle, albeit it shows the wider regional and inter-national concerns of families ruling in the north of England and in Scotland.  The Northumbrian prince Eanfrith had been exiled in Pictland in the early part of the century and became attached to a Pictish princess. Their son Talorcan became king of the Picts. Both British Strathclyde and English Northumbria both wanted to exercise controlling interest in the lands to the north of them, and at time in the English case, direct rule over the southern part of Pictland, and therefore we could be justified as seeing southern Pictland as the prize decisively claimed on the battlefield in 685, and another circumstantial piece of support that the encounter took place in the disputed area.

  In chapter 57 of the Welsh Historia Brittonum it is stated that Ecgfrith fought against his fratuelem (cousin) Bridei, ‘and there he fell with all the strength of his army, and the Picts and their king were victorious, and the English thugs never grew [strong enough] from that battle to extract tribute from the Picts. It was called the battle of Lyn Garan.’

Alex Woolf translates the text as:  ‘It is this Ecgfrith who fought a battle against his parallel cousin, who was king of the Picts, by name Bredei.’

A.O. Anderson states that:

Brude’s mother’s father must have been one of the sons of Æthelfrith.  But since we may assume that Brude claimed part of the kingdom through his mother, her father must have been a descendant of Eanfrith, who married a Pictish princess (617 x 633), and whose son Talorcan held the Pictish throne from 653 to 657.  The dates seem to decide that Brude must have been Eanfrith’s grandson, not Talorcan’s.’

Alfred Smyth, acting on the undisputed fact that the victor of the battle was son of the British king of Dumbarton, Bili, states that Bridei’s victory cemented Strathclyde’s overlordship of the southern part of Pictland.  A. O. Anderson tellingly suggested that Bridei inherited Pictland south of the Tay from his father and the lands to the north from his mother’s family.  Perhaps this should be amended to a situation where he claimed Pictland south of the Grampians from his father (or grandfather’s) territorial claims, and the lands to the north from his mother’s kin.

Even supposing that the northerly position of Fortriu is now accepted, this does not exclusively place Bridei in that area; his southern associations were indisputable as a son of the ruling house of Strathclyde. The wider campaign featured a sustained and, on the surface, surprising campaign by the Northumbrians against Ireland.  Smyth again points out that this was at least partly motivated by the undoubted presence of a displaced and extremely active British war band there, whom he suggests had originated in either Rheged or Gododdin, British territories which the Northumbrians were actively encompassing into their realm.  Leslie Alcock suggests that the English may have taken hostages while in Ireland to prevent Irish allies actively assisting Strathclyde and/or the Picts in military action in the north of Britain, though the theory that Northumbria would have launched a strike in foreign territory solely to subdue the possible intervention of Irish powers in northern Scotland seems rather weak.  Whatever the motivation for the expedition, it has to be admitted that Ecgfrith’s long-reach to Ireland supports a military capability to send a force into northern Pictland, albeit a naval raid is logistically easier than a long-range land campaign.

   The monks of Meath extended their enmity  (if not an actual formalised curse against the violence of the northern English monarch).  A poem ascribed to Riagual of Bangor preserves the hatred against the Northumbrian:

It has frequently been claimed that the Picts regained their independence after the battle, which supposes they had lost it (at least partially) before 685.  Warfare between Picts and the northern English continued intermittently for some time, into the 8^th century, though perhaps the scale was not so great as the encounter at Nechtansmere.  In the year 698 the dux Berctred (perhaps a royal leader) of the Northumbrians was slain by the Picts at a place unknown.  One sources calls him the consul of King Ecgfrith and interestingly states that he too fell victim of Irish curses, in retaliation for raids on churches in that land.  It states that he went into Pictish territory to avenge Ecgfrith and there too met his end.

   In the year 711 another high-ranking noble, Bertfrid (the ‘prefect’ of King Osred), also described as ‘second prince from the king’, was victorious against the Picts.  The similarity of his name to the official who died in 698 (and also the Northumbrian who ravaged Ireland in the 680s) may mean they were close relatives.  By the time Bede wrote his Historia Ecclesiastica in 731 there was a treaty of peace between Angles and Picts.  This had its roots in the actions of the Pictish king Nechtan mac Derile who, several years earlier, as Bede recounts, asked Ceolfrid the Abbot of Jarrow to send him writings concerning the correct date of Easter and also architects so he could build a church of stone in the Roman manner.  It is important to bear in mind F. T. Wainwright’s warning not to overestimate the importance of the battle.  The event was not a permanent turning point in the power struggles of the four northern nations, nor a proto Bannockburn.  The Picts may have regained independence, but further defeats were inflicted upon them by the English.  The Northumbrians held sway up to the Forth and the Britons may have temporarily gained the upper hand, but in the following century they suffered further military and territorial defeats by the English.  The Scots of Dalriada, in the wings meanwhile, had to wait a century for the beginning of their ascendancy. 

   The following points regarding the pros and cons of Strathmore v Badenoch as the battle site are intended more for illustration of the issues rather than a fully weighed balancing of the respective merits of each place.

    The landscape of both Dunnichen in Angus and Dunnachton in Badenoch, Inverness-shire, have naturally changed a great deal in the centuries since 685 AD,  Arguably the change has been greater in the former, with unremitting human settlement, farming and drainage vastly altering the land.  Nechtan's Mere itself has been drained, and it is likely that it once formed a chain of lochs in this part of Strathmore.  Without going into detail there are disputes about the exact location of the battlefield, even if we accept that the battle was fought in this locality.  Fraser and Alcock have differing views, which we will not go into here.  Another interesting point is the location of possible local power bases which Bridei may have used.  The fort on Dunnichen seems to have been rather small, as far as we can judge, but the complex of duns and forts on Turin Hill, not far north at Rescobie (one of which was known as Kemp's Castle), looks more promising as the putative regional power base for the whole region. (Turin will be the subject of a future post.)

For Dunachton:  The mountainous terrain matches the brief description in one Northumbrian source.

Against Dunachton:  Considerable distance from the main territory of the Northumbrians. No supplementary evidence that there was either a battle in the area of that this was a conspicuous focus of Pictish power.  The symbol stone at Dunachton is an earlier example (formerly known as Class I) and does not have any representations of battle, fighting or armed men; nor do there seem to be any such stones (similar to the Aberlemno stone) within the vicinity of Dunachton.   There are no major  known Dark Age Pictish strongholds in the area.

For Dunnichen:  The Pictish stone at Aberlemno undoubtedly portrays a major battle and is the only surviving representation of battle on any Pictish stone, only 5km from Dunnichen.    The proximity of the probably hill fort on Dunnichen Hill, plus another several miles away on Turin Hill.

Against Dunnichen:  Geography does not seem to match description of mountainous terrain in the English description given by Bede.

It has to be stated that nowhere is it stated that the Battle of Dunnichen/Nechtansmere/ Dún Nechtain actually took place in the kingdom or district of Fortriu, so the consequence of Fortriu’s re-alignment is almost irrelevant to the placement of the battle. James Fraser wrote his Battle of Dunnichen before the publication of Alex Woolf’s article.  In From Caledonia to Pictland he acknowledges the merits of Dunachton as a possible alternative location for the battle, but still advises that Dunnichen should not be ruled out.  There is the powerful neighbouring presence of the Aberlemno stone and also, as he points out, this is the zone from which the Northumbrians were rulers and were now removed.