[Gutenberg 50249] • Orkney and Shetland Folk 872-1350

Excerpt from Orkney and Shetland Folk, 872-1350

The earliest inhabitants, of whom we have any record, were the Picts, and the Irish papas and Colum ban missionaries, who must have brought some Irish settlers with them.

It has already been suggested that the Norse must have settled in Orkney and Shetland, circa 664, among the aboriginal race, the Picts, who would have become their thralls, and with whom the settlers would have intermarried.

The first Norsemen who came to Orkney and Shet land would have been adventurers, and not settlers with wives, families and thralls, such as later went to Ice land and Orkney. Consequently such adventurers who settled in the islands would naturally have intermarried with the aborigines. This kind of male settlement ma)r have gone on for some time, before the actual bona fide colonisation took place.

About the Publisher

Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at [www.forgottenbooks.com](http://www.forgottenbooks.com)

This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.