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It is said that the Picts got their name from the Romans, who called them Picti, which is Latin for ‘painted people’. This is thought to refer to the tales of the Picts painting and tattooing their bodies.

David MacRitchie, a Scottish folklorist (1851-1925), argued that fairies were based on a real diminutive or pygmy-statured population that lived in Scotland during the late Stone Age:

"Postulations based on the premise that fairies constitute a…

Pictish buildings would appear to have varied depending on regional location and building material available.

Evidence of Pictish housing finds them to be of a reasonable size, round or oval shaped with no windows and a central hearth. Access to…

The original location of the Rosemarkie Cross Slab was most likely within a Pictish settlement or monastery, it later was used as a floor slab in Rosemarkie Church and also stood in the Churchyard, before being moved and preserved within Groam House…

(From left to right) The Mace of the Faculty of Arts. See also: http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/musa/see/starobjects/stsalvatorsmace/ A seal depicting the cathedral The seal of the University of St Andrews The university seal matrix The Statutes of St…

Kirk Hill (or Kirk Heugh as it is sometimes called) has a long history of human activity. Archaeologists have found evidence of prehistoric burials at this site, perhaps dating from as long ago as 500 B.C. There are also some signs of early metal…

The small building now known as St Rule's Church was once St Andrews' main cathedral. It was probably built in the early twelfth century, perhaps by workmen from northern England. The church is in the Romanesque (or Norman) style that was then…

St Andrews Cathedral was once the most important church in Scotland. It was the base for the country's senior bishopric and housed the relics of St Andrew (the nation's patron saint). For many centuries St Andrews Cathedral was the largest building…

The ruins at Blackfriars are all that remain of St Andrews' Dominican friary. The Dominicans (also known as the Black Friars because of the colour of their cloaks) are a Catholic religious order founded in France in the thirteenth century. They were…

Like many medieval English and continental cathedrals, St Andrews had an associated monastery. In the mid-twelfth century a priory of Augustinian canons was founded at St Andrews Cathedral (displacing an earlier community of Celtic holy men). The…

At the east end of South Street there is a pair of fourteenth-century arches known as "the Pends". These were part of a gateway to the walled enclosure surrounding St Andrews Cathedral. During the Middle Ages many cathedrals and monasteries had…

St Salvator's Chapel is one of St Andrews University's two surviving medieval chapels (the other is St Leonard's Chapel on South Street). It was built in the 1450s by Bishop James Kennedy as a place of worship for the members of his new College of St…

The origins of St Leonard's may go back as far as the twelfth century, when an (unnamed) hospital was referred to in a document concerning St Andrews Cathedral. By the mid thirteenth century a hospital dedicated to St Leonard was firmly established…

Outlined in the paving on Market Street is the location of St Andrews' former tolbooth (the Scottish equivalent of a town hall). We do not know precisely when St Andrews’ tolbooth was built, but recent archaeological excavation suggests the site has…

The site of St Mary's College was one of the first properties acquired by the University of St Andrews. When the university was founded in 1413 it had no buildings of its own and lecturers taught in borrowed rooms. However, in 1419 a college…

St Andrews Castle was the home of the bishops of St Andrews. The site has been fortified since at least the 1190s. However, most of what we see today was built between 1380 and 1560. St Andrews Castle was the scene of major events in Scottish…