Pictish Beast
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The Pictish Beast (sometimes Pictish Dragon or Pictish Elephant) is an artistic representation of an animal depicted on Pictish symbol stones.
Design[edit]
The Pictish Beast is not easily identifiable with any real animal, but resembles a seahorse, especially when depicted upright. Suggestions have included a dolphin, an anteater, an elephant, a kelpie (or each uisge), and even the Loch Ness Monster.[citation needed]
Recent[when?] thinking[by whom?] is that the Pictish Beast might be related to the design of dragonesque brooches, which are S-shaped pieces of jewellery, made from the mid-1st to the 2nd century CE, that depict double-headed animals with swirled snouts and distinctive ears. A few[quantify] of these have been found[where?] in Scotland, though the great[quantify] majority have been found in northern England. The strongest evidence[according to whom?] for this is the presence on the Mortlach 2 stone of a symbol very similar to such a brooch, next to and in the same alignment as a Pictish Beast.[citation needed]
The Pictish Beast accounts for about 40% of all Pictish animal depictions, and so was likely of great importance.[citation needed]
The Pictish Beast is thought[by whom?] to have been an important figure in Pictish mythology, and possibly even a political symbol.[citation needed]
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St Martin's stone
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Strathmartine Castle Stone
See also[edit]
References[edit]
![]() | This article includes a list of references, related reading, or external links, but its sources remain unclear because it lacks inline citations. (June 2017) |
Bibliography[edit]
![](http://upload.luquay.com/wikipedia/en/thumb/4/4a/Commons-logo.svg/30px-Commons-logo.svg.png)
- Jones, Duncan (2003). A Wee Guide to the Picts. Musselburgh.
- Cessford, Craig (June 2005). "Pictish art and the sea". The Heroic Age: A Journal of Medieval Northwestern Europe (8). ISSN 1526-1867.
External links[edit]