The Legend of the Pictish Heather Ale
Hello, everyone, and welcome to Camelot Chat! I’m your hostess, Shannon Watson; and today, we will be discussing the shadowy Legend of the Pictish Heather Ale.
Robert Lewis Stevenson wrote of the legendary heather ale of the Picts, saying:
From the bonny bells of heather
They brewed a drink long-syne,
Was sweeter far than honey,
Was stronger far than wine.
This poem was followed by a retelling of the legend of how the secret recipe of the Pictish heather ale–which sustained men through starvation, long hunting trips, and sieges, and made them fight harder in battle–came to be lost.
Stevenson’s was a later version of the fable, but its gist is clear enough. The story goes something like this:
One day while riding, a king came upon two Picts, a father and a son. They were, in fact, the last of their kind, for the king and his men–stories differ as to whether the king’s men were Irish, Roman, Viking, or some other enemy race–had just wiped out all their brethren in battle.
The king did not want to kill the two Picts, for he knew of their powerful heather ale and wanted the secret for himself. But he did not know how to brew the drink.
So, he offered them a deal: “Tell me the recipe, and I will let you live.”
The father did not trust the king. Quell surprise!
So, he told the king to kill his son, so the boy could not turn on his father for betraying the secret. The king’s men took the son and quickly executed him.
Upon which, the father smiled. He told the furious king that now nothing–no threat, no torture, no bribe–would avail him. No one could make him reveal the recipe of the Pictish heather ale, and the king had just killed the only other person who knew it.
Must have been some ale. But seriously, anything that could prolong a man’s strength, his tenacity in the hunt, his ferocity in battle, was something people of King Arthur’s day would have readily killed for. If such an ale ever existed, it must have been a carefully guarded secret.
And it seems that such an ale might actually have existed.
For, aside from Scotland’s wild mountainsides and valleys being covered in heather, there survives another version of this tale that appears to be even older than the first one. It is set, in fact, in the fifth century: the age of Arthur, and of Guinevere and her Picts.
It goes something like this.
The Irish chieftain and reiver, Niall Nine Hostages–who may have been an ancestor of Queen Guinevere’s–was raiding the Picts of Galloway in the south of Scotland. These may have been the Niduari, or the River Nith Picts, or the Novantae, who lived in and around what is now Dumfriesshire.
I believe, in fact, that the two Pictish “tribes” were the same, for their names both seem to derive from the word for “new”: novant in Latin, matching the Novantae, and Newɨð in Proto-Brythonic, which language may have been closely related to the Pictish tongue.
The story says that six ugly days of slaughter between the Irish and the Picts ensued. After which, all but one clan of Picts were eradicated. That tribe retreated to the southernmost point of Scotland: The Mull of Galloway, where they dug in–literally, for an earthen bank-and-ditch formation can still be seen there–and made their last stand against the advancing Irish.
There is, of course, a bad guy in the plot.
There is always a bad guy. And the famous Niall Nine-Hostages cannot be our villain. Most of modern Ireland is still related to Niall, so it must be someone else.
Why not a Pict? There are no more of them, anymore, so no one can be offended.
Sure enough, our bad guy is a Pict named Sionach, which means “Fox.” Sionach the Fox was a spy for Niall and a traitor to his own people. In this version of the tale, Sionach is the one who relayed to the king that this particular Pictish clan were the keepers of the secret recipe of the heather ale.
A strange mention of a second “secret condiment” that only Pictish hunters were privy to is embedded in the middle of this tale. It was called the “food of strength.” And the fact that it's mentioned in conjunction with the heather ale makes me wonder whether the two might have been one and the same.
Like the heather ale, this condiment allowed Pictish heroes to endure extreme privation. And it enabled the last surviving Pictish father and his three sons to live through six days of siege on the Mull of Galloway.
But on the seventh: the stores of–whatever the “food of heroes” was–ran out, and starvation set in.
Like the king in the first story, the chieftain, Niall, said: “Tell me the secret of the heather ale, and I will let you live.”
Once more, the father agreed. On one condition: that Niall kill him and his two youngest sons. Only then, would the eldest son reveal the secret recipe.
Niall Nine-Hostages did as he asked and butchered the father and his two youngest sons, probably right in front of their brother. Spoiler alert: This was not the smartest thing Niall could have done at this time.
The eldest son’s name was Trost.
This name puts me in mind of a character who plays a serious role in at least half of The Annals of Anavere, my series of novels based in Arthurian legend. The name of one of my Pictish characters is Drus. In Proto-Brythonic, drus or drust means “door.” In Proto-Celtic, it means “trustworthy” or “firm.” And, when rendered into Old Irish, a similar word, drús, becomes “lust” or “desire.”
My character, Drus, is based upon a Pictish king of the same name, or a variant of it. This king was sometimes also called Drust of the Hundred Battles, and he was a famous warrior. I believe the medieval Arthurian character, Sir Tristan, or Drustan, is based upon this great Pictish king.
That said, the name, Drus, or Drust, seems to have been a repeat offender in the Pictish King List, for it occurs again and again. Admittedly, people liked to name their sons after famous warrior-kings, so this may be the reason we see it so often.
With some adjustments to the suggested historical dates, I have King Drus’ lifespan as follows: He was born circa 432 AD. He ascended the throne around the year 452, at the age of 20. And he died in the year 478, at the age of 46.
Niall Nine-Hostages, the famous Irish reiver, is believed to have died in a sea battle in the year 405 AD. If that date is correct, Trost could not have been the same person as the Pictish king, Drus. The earliest suggested date of birth–which I don’t agree with–for Drus is 407, and that is still too late for him to have had an altercation with Niall. Perhaps, King Drus was named for the earlier legendary warrior, Trost? Either way, these names seem to be one and the same.
For, this incident on the Mull of Galloway was certainly not the last stand of the Picts. It is merely supposed to relate the loss of the secret of the heather ale. And to recount the courage and determination of four valiant warriors.
Whoever Trost was, I think you know where this is going.
Niall wanted the secret. Trost did not want to give it to him. He gave him lip service instead.
Trost insisted that he could not tell the secret to anyone who was not a Pict. He pointed at Sionach, saying that there was one of his countrymen with whom he could share the secret.
Obviously, Sionach did not want to go with Trost, but Niall pointed out that Trost was unarmed. And of course, peer pressure did the rest.
Sionach went apart with the ferocious Trost, who threw his arms around the traitor, crying out, “The secret dies with me!” Trost leapt with Sionach over a cliff. And the secret, as predicted, died with him.
To this day, no one knows the secret recipe to making heather ale. Or whether it really boosted one’s strength in battle or sustained one when there was nothing else to eat.
But the Picts fought on. Their fiery blood no doubt runs in the veins of modern-day Scots everywhere. And their legacy still flowers in the wild hills and dales of evergreen Scotland.
I will leave you with a toast. It is one I wrote for the Picts of my book, The Wanderer and the Wolves.
Actually, it falls somewhere between a toast and a curse. See what you think.
Purple in Field,
Purple on Steel,
Purple to Those Who Never Kneel.
Purple in Throat,
Wet Purple Moat,
Purple of Dead Battler’s Bloat.
Purple in Ale,
Purple War-Wail:
Purple is Courage that Never Fails.
The purple represents the color of the heather blooms, although I have no idea whether the ale came out the same color. But I like to think it did.
Next month, we will dig into another Pictish warrior: Sir Bedivere… and his ferocious, warlike legacy.
Who was Bedivere? Was this man, who served as cupbearer and bodyguard to King Arthur, truly a “knight in shining armor?” Was he the last person to see Arthur alive? To take up the sword Excalibur and fling it back into the sea whence it came?
Or are we looking at a very different man? A Pict who fought naked except for a wolf skin and transformed, at least psychologically, into a werewolf in battle? Like the ancient Anglo-Saxon berserkers?
Find out on next week's episode of Camelot Chat!
If you can’t wait for more Arthurian lore till the next episode, you will find my historical fiction novel, The Wanderer and the Wolves, told from Queen Guinevere’s perspective, on Amazon.com. The link is included below. And be sure to check out my author page at ShanavereStudios.com.
Until next week: People who read live in many worlds. Books are the surest portals to those worlds. So, keep living, keep reading, and keep dreaming... till we meet again.
