It seems the period from 300 AD to 900 AD may not have been as dark as previously thought. This is a time that Scotland has traditionally been portrayed as a nation of blue-painted Picts warding off marauding Vikings.

Alice Blackwell, a Glenmorangie Research Officer with Scotland’s National Museums, has spent the past 3 years studying artifacts from the period, and she disputes the gloomy picture of the Dark Ages. The Picts inhabited only part of Scotland, and other social groupings conducted trade and exchanged intellectual ideas with much of Europe.

Glenmorangie, it appears, is giving us more than single malt. Alice Blackwell’s book “A Jewel of Gold Placed on a Silver Dish” will be published in the fall.