Painted pebbles are a class of Pictish artifact unique to northern Scotland in the first millennium AD.
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They are small rounded beach pebbles made of quartzite, which have been painted with simple designs in a dye which is now dark brown in colour. The size varies from 18 mm by 22 mm to 65 mm by 51mm. It has not proven possible to analyse the dye itself from the stains that remain.
The motifs are carefully executed and the most common are dots and wavy lines. Other motifs are small circles, pentacles, crescents and triangles, showing strong relationships with the Pictish symbol stone motifs.[1]
Over the last ninety years nineteen painted pebbles have been found in sites in the Northern Isles and in Caithness. Most have come from broch sites which have been shown to have had an extensive post-broch occupation. An ogham - inscribed spindle-whorl was associated with one find at Buckquoy in Orkney (see Buckquoy spindle whorl). Several have been associate with wheelhouses or their outbuildings. An example was found at a Pictish site at Buckquoy in Orkney as reported in 1976. It had the 'small ring' type decoration.[2]
Painted pebbles have been dated to the period 200 AD to the eighth century AD, the Pictish period. They may have been sling-stones that were thought to be of magical nature by the picts, however local traditions suggest that they were 'charm-stones', often known as 'Cold-stones'. Such stones were used within living memory (1971) to cure sickness in animals and humans.[1]
In the Life of St. Columba it is recorded that he visited King Bridei in Pictland in around the year 565 AD and taking a white stone pebble from the River Ness he blessed it and any water it came into contact with would cure sick people. It floated in water and cured the king from a terminal illness. It remained as one of the great treasures of the king and cured many others.
The belief in charm-stones is well documented in medieval Iceland (Proc Soc Antiq Scot).
Examples of 'charm-stones' or 'cold-stones' are held at National Museum of Rural Life, Kittochside, near East Kilbride.