This is the first to appear of a number of comprehensive studies of the Picts by various well-known authorities which have for some time been rumoured to be in preparation. The Laings are first into print, and it will be fascinating to see the different approaches and emphases that Charles Thomas and Anna Ritchie bring to the subject when their books are published. The Picts and the Scots is the first study that gives equal weight to the two of Scotland's Dark Age peoples living north of the Forth-Clyde isthmus, and this is very much in accordance with the way the ideas of archaeologists and art historians have been moving in recent years. The relations between the two nations of the Picts and the Scots were long, complex and close, though certainly often far from friendly; it is no longer possible or desirable to treat both in isolation, and there is much in the book that serves to emphasise this

The introduction brings out the fact that only a few decades ago such a study as this, tentative though many of its conclusions inevitably are, would have been unthinkable. A glance at such past classics as The Problem of the Picts and Henderson's The Picts shows just how blank the record was in many major areas of Scotland's Dark Age culture settlements, burials, everyday artefacts and other fields were truly dark until very recently. The Introduction puts it succinctly: "The picture is still tantalizingly inadequate, but thanks to research carried out in recent years it is at least possible to attempt the survey that this book represents" (vii)

The Picts and the Scots is a synthesis of current knowledge, written for the general reader, but just as useful to the specialist. If much that was unknown about the early historic peoples is now at least beginning to come into focus, there remains an immense amount of work to do, and the authors would be the first to admit that this book, excellent as it is as an introduction to the current state of Pictish and Scottish studies, is a first sketch rather than a completed portrait of the culture of our distant ancestors. It is this sort of synthesis, allowing an overview of present knowledge, which shows how many questions remain to be answered, and helps to point the way to future research.

After an Introduction which summarises the historical and archaeological backgrounds of both peoples, the book is divided into four chapters dealing with the Picts, the Scots, and the everyday life and the art of the two nations

The chapter on the Picts takes the reader on a brisk tour of current knowledge, dealing with the rise of antiquarian interest in them, their (violent) history, their language, and their religions, Pagan and Christian. The authors have not fought shy of tackling the mystery of the Newton Stone inscription, around which an air of Victorian eccentricity still hangs, nor of speculating in a fascinating way on the clues to the Picts' pre-Christian beliefs and practices.

The Scots' chapter starts back in Ireland with Prehistoric links between the adjacent parts of Scotland and Ireland, and proceeds through raids on Roman Britain and the colonisation of the kingdom of Dal Riada to a study of the early Irish Church in both countries, due weight being given to the pre-erminence, spiritual and cultural, of Iona, though other monastic sites are touched on.

I would class the chapters on everyday life and art as the most valuable and original in the book. In Celtic society "everyday life" included warfare, as well as trade, crafts, pastimes, house types and so on, and these and other topics are all covered, with the evidence of the carved stones being used to illuminate the picture to good effect. There is still far more known about high status sites forts, brochs, souterrains - than about the peasant dwellings of the average Pict or Scot, but some characteristic workaday artefacts can now be identified. Many were used equally by both peoples. Under forts, Dunadd is dealt with in detail. The Laings - in contrast to the Royal Commission - see no reason to ascribe the boar and Ogham carvings in the fort to the Picts, and are also prepared to suggest that they may be very early C5th and C7th respectively.

The final chapter, on art, is my favourite, and is perhaps the one where the authors' enthusiasm shines out most clearly. The introduction pulls no punches about the brilliance of our Early Mediaeval art: "The Picts and Scots between them were responsible for some of the greatest art to survive " from Dark Age Europe (x). Any study of Pictish art must start with the mystery of the symbols, and there is an enlightening discussion here about their possible origin, date and decline. The Laings favour an early origin date, and suggest this also for the Norrie's Law silverwork, about which there is continuing controversy. Pictish animals are dealt with in depth, and their possible precursors pursued over a wide area, while sculpture is also discussed in detail. Less space is devoted to the art of Dal Riada, from which fewer outstanding works are recorded, but it is good to know that the Book of Kells, the Book of Durrow, and the Hunterston Brooch seem likely to have originated in the territory of the Scots, within which Columba's monastery of Iona served as the greatest cultural powerhouse in the Celtic world.

This book has aimed for high production values, but has not always hit the mark. Illustrations in black and white and colour are plentiful, but of curiously uneven quality. Many of the photographs are excellent - one might mention some by the PAS' own Tom E Gray while others are small, dark and smudged-looking. The line drawings too are of variable quality, and some are frankly poor, especially those which, for no obvious reason, are redrawn from works published by other authors. It is good to see pictures of some of the lesser known Dark Age artefacts - the Ogham-inscribed knife handle that some wandering Pictish pilgrim dropped in Norfolk, for instance (Fig 12, 21), or the fine mount decorated with a wolf found with the Westness Brooch on Rousay (Fig 117, 144) but the labelling of some of the pictures is at times careless. Fig 99, showing the Glamis Manse Stone, describes the incised mirror on the back as a "ring symbol" (130), while the colour plate 7, labelled as showing Ardestie Souterrain. in fact shows the line of small stone houses by the structure and misses it out almost completely.

A design touch I like is the use of two pages of the Book of Deer to decorate the inside front and back covers, but I suspect that a certain carelessness of approach (shown, for instance, by a fair number of spelling mistakes in the text), may suggest that The Picts and the Scots was rather rushed into print.

Despite these minor points, this book is well worthy of any Pictish enthusiast's attention, and I am certainly far from being so overwhelmed by a growing stream of publications on our period of interest as not to be grateful to the authors for presenting us with a most useful overview of the history, archaeology and art of the Picts and the Scots. Thanks too for the mention ofthe PAS on page 167

Niall M Robertson