Battle of Dun Nechtain

Date: May 20, 685 • Location: Haltwhistle, United Kingdom

This milestone marked the outbreak and beginning of this historic period, which spanned 685.

The Picts defeated the Northumbrians at the Battle of Dun Nechtain, severely weakening the latter's power in northern Great Britain.

The Picts were a group of peoples in what is now Scotland north of the Firth of Forth, in the Early Middle Ages. Where they lived and details of their culture can be gleaned from early medieval texts and Pictish stones. The name Picti appears in written records as an exonym from the late third century AD. They are assumed to have been descendants of the Caledonii and other northern Iron Age tribes.