Katherine S. Forsyth is a Scottish historian who specializes in the history and culture of Celtic-speaking peoples during the 1st millennium AD, in particular the

Picts The Picts were a group of peoples who lived in what is now northern and eastern Scotland (north of the Firth of Forth) during Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. Where they lived and what their culture was like can be inferred from ea ...

. She is currently a professor i
Celtic and Gaelic
at the

University of Glasgow , image = UofG Coat of Arms.png , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms Flag , latin_name = Universitas Glasguensis , motto = la, Via, Veritas, Vita , ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

. Forsyth is an expert in the

Ogham script Ogham (Modern Irish: ; mga, ogum, ogom, later mga, ogam, label=none ) is an Early Medieval alphabet used primarily to write the early Irish language (in the "orthodox" inscriptions, 4th to 6th centuries AD), and later the Old Irish langua ...

, and has provided readings for a number of Ogham inscriptions, including the

Buckquoy spindle-whorl The Buckquoy spindle-whorl is an Ogham-inscribed spindle-whorl dating from the Early Middle Ages, probably the 8th century, which was found in 1970 in Buckquoy, Birsay, Orkney, Scotland. Made of sandy limestone, it is about 36 mm in diameter ...

and the

Lunnasting stone The Lunnasting stone is a stone bearing an ogham inscription, found at Lunnasting, Shetland and donated to the National Museum of Antiquities of Scotland in 1876. Discovery The stone was found by Rev. J.C. Roger in a cottage, who stated that it ...

. Forsyth has reinterpreted a number of Pictish Ogham stone inscriptions that were previously thought to be written in an unknown pre-Indo-European language, and has argued that the Picts spoke a Brythonic language.Forsyth (1997)

Works

* 1995.
The ogham-inscribed spindle-whorl from Buckquoy: evidence for the Irish language in pre-Viking Orkney?
. In ''Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland'' 125: 677–696. * 1995. "Language in Pictland: spoken and written". In Nicoll, E.H. and Forsyth, K. (eds.), ''A Pictish Panorama: the story of the Picts''. Pinkfoot Press. * 1995. "Some thoughts on Pictish symbols as a formal writing system". In Henderson, I. and Henry, D. (eds.), ''The Worm, the Germ and the Thorn: Pictish and Related Studies Presented to Isabel Henderson''. Pinkfoot Press. * 1997.
Language in Pictland: the case against 'non-Indo-European Pictish
'. Studia Hameliana, 2. Utrecht: De Keltiche Draak * 2001. Okasha, E. and Forsyth, K., ''Early Christian inscriptions of Munster: a corpus of the inscribed stones''. Cork: Cork University Press. * 2005. "HIC MEMORIA PERPETUA: the inscribed stones of sub-Roman southern Scotland". In: Foster, S.M. and Cross, M. (eds.) ''Able Minds and Practised Hands: Scotland's Early Medieval Sculpture in the Twenty-First Century''. Society for Medieval Archaeology Monograph Series (23). Society for Medieval Archaeology. * 2007. "An ogham-inscribed plaque from Bornais, South Uist". In Ballin-Smith, B., Taylor, S. and Williams, G. (eds.), ''West over Sea: Studies in Scandinavian Sea-Borne Expansion and Settlement Before 1300''. Leiden: Brill. * 2008. Forsyth, K. (ed.), ''Studies on the Book of Deer''. Dublin: Four Courts Press. * 2011. Barrowman, R.C. and Forsyth, K., "An Ogham-Inscribed Slab from St Ninian’s Isle, Found in 1876". In ''The Chapel and Burial Ground on St Ninian’s Isle, Shetland. Excavations Past and Present''. Society for Medieval Archaeology.

Notes

References

* *

External links

Katherine Forsyth's page at the University of Glasgow
Academics of the University of Glasgow 20th-century Scottish historians British women historians Oghamologists Linguists of Pictish Year of birth missing (living people) Living people {{UK-historian-stub Scottish women academics 21st-century Scottish historians