Prior to the inception of the Tarbat Discovery Programme, which was designed to explore the archaeological site centred on St Colman’s Church, Portmahomack, Ross-shire (Figure 3.1), the strongest Norse association from the site was a silver hoard deposited c. 1000, placename evidence and historical references to Torfness (Tarbatness). Thirteen seasons of open-area excavation, field survey and a lengthy post-excavation phase have reframed the site as the first Pictish monastic settlement to be excavated (Carver et al. 2016). What Portmahomack offers to the subject of ‘Viking Scotland’ is how life in this frontier zone was modelled and shaped by politics and ideology in the 9th to 11th centuries, beginning with an abrupt interruption aligned with a hitherto undocumented Viking raid.

The Pictish monastery

The extensive archaeological site surrounding St Colman’s Church was first identified from the air, appearing as a cropmark in the dry summer of 1984 (Figure 3.2). Excavation revealed the cropmark belonged to a complex water-collection system which simultaneously fed and enclosed a planned site. Between 1994 and 2007, a large T-shaped transect within the enclosure was excavated and the geography of the monastery was explored and defined. The monastery was founded at the site of a 5th- to 7th-century elite estate centre in c. 680 and flourished up until c. 780–810, when the trajectory of the site took a dramatic turn.

The Tarbat peninsula, long favoured for its natural attributes, sits between the Dornoch and Cromarty firths and enjoys sheltered access to the sea from the sandy bay at Portmahomack. Access between the firths can be made via the north–south portage across the peninsula during rough weather, as well as access to the Great Glen and its resources to the west. The peninsula boasts good-quality arable land, rare and highly prized terrain in north-east Scotland, and enjoys low rainfall compared to adjacent areas, and turf and peat suitable for exploitation for fuel.

The monastic settlement lay undefended, on the raised beach overlooking the sandy landing bay. The monastic church and its cemetery, marked in the 8th century by three magnificent cross-slabs and a free-standing cross, occupied an area now under and around the present church.