For, early Pictish culture appears to directly be a continuation of the old customs, institutions, and socio-political order of the megalith-builders of Bronze Age Britain. The Picts possessed a distinctive culture, seen particularly in their exotic pottery, their artwork [such as their carved symbols on stone], their jewellery, etc. Their language, presumed to have been non-Indo-European, which the Romans said was akin to the Basque tongue, which had partially been "celticized" by this time, included an alphabet or system-of-writing that has not yet been deciphered, which was forgotten upon their extinction or rather their absorption by later British races. The Picts, so-called by the Romans, called the "Cruithni" by the Irish Gaels, from the Q-Celtic dialect, which may be translated into the P-Celtic dialect as "Pretani", gave the British Isles their name, "Pretannia", whence the Latin "Britannia".

The territory of the Picts, reduced to the islands and coasts of the Irish Sea, became a separate British kingdom, whose capital city was Aberffraw, on the Isle of Anglesey, off the north-west fringe of Wales, Caernarvonshire, which was the Iron Age successor-state of the old British Bronze Age kingdom, which is sometimes called the Kingdom of Aberffraw, or the Welsh Iron Age kingdom, or the Pictish "Old Kingdom", whose culture, called the Pict "A" culture, was a continuation of the proto-Pict "C" culture of the British Bronze Age. The first king of the Picts was Cruach (Croich), the son of the sister of Britain’s last Bronze Age King, Ogmios, and "a foreign prince" [perhaps the Greek epic hero Hercules, whose image is found in Pictish artwork].

Cruach established himself as Ogmios’ successor, and put together the old British government-in-exile, which became a kingdom, while trying to retake the island from the Albanese invaders. He held sway over Western Wales, South-West Scotland, Eastern Ireland, and Western France. Cruach was later deified as the sun-god in the pagan druidic pantheon. Irish legend says that the druids instituted the worship of Cruach as the founding-deity of the Pictish Nation in all Pictish territories. They erected a large image of Cruach that became an idol to which the Picts offered their "first-fruits". It stood on the plain of Mag Slecht, Co. Cavan, near the modern village of Ballymagauran, in Ulster.

This great idol, called "Crom Cruach" or "Cenn Cruaic", was destroyed over a thousand years later by St. Patrick when he brought Christianity to Ireland in the fifth century AD. The Pictish "Old Kingdom", which produced the Pictish "A" culture, flourished the first half of the Old Iron Age. The successors of Cruach, its first king, all descendants in the female line through his sister, according to the matrilineal principle, while his male-line descendants held no special status. The succession to the British Bronze Age sacral-kingship continued as before through the female-line during the British Iron Age, however, since the male-line of Britain's Bronze Age Royal House had become extinct, the women of the royal blood, that is, the vestal-virgins, who always stayed at home, now took as their consorts during the Iron Age the tribal chiefs/kings of the various tribes of the British Isles and Gaul or sometimes of another country.

It occupied a position of strategic importance in the shipping-lanes of the Irish Sea connecting major trade routes between Wales and Ireland, or Wales and Scotland, or Wales and France. The name of the Pictish citadel or hill-fort "Tre’r Ceiri" in Caernarvonshire translates as "town of giants". This shows that the Picts were still called “giants” by the Welsh in medieval times. The elaborate chambered tomb of Bryn-Celli-Dhu on the Isle of Anglesey was the royal necropolis of the old Pictish kings of Aberffraw.  It is one of the finest examples of a “passage grave” in the British Isles. A grandiose Iron Age temple was built out of stone off Anglesey on the near-by isle called "Holy Isle" about 1250/1000BC on the model of the earlier Bronze Age temple at Glastonbury.

Hecataeus wrote that Apollo visited the island [Britain] once every nineteen years, during which period the stars, completing their revolutions, returned to their former places in the sky. On this account, the classic wrote, the Greeks called the cycle of nineteen years as the "Great Year". Hecataeus misidentified the Britons with the Scandinavian "Hyperboreans", but the name "Hyperboreans" appears to have been used rather vaguely by ancient writers. The Pictish kingdom in Wales expanded across the Irish Sea, which was not a divider but was a link to other Pictish settlements, as the Aegean Sea was to the Classical Greeks, and around the Irish Sea arose a maritime society which flourished during the Iron Age before the Roman conquest. The Pictish achievement was that overlordship of such a far-flung collection of scattered settlements could be a reality, however, a common culture and language, the highly organized socio-political, religious, and economic systems of the Pictish bureaucratic-state, and a common allegiance to one crown, was what actually held Pictish society together.

The Picts still occupied considerable territories on the British mainland, it was just their capital-city or the royal residence which was moved to safety across the Irish Sea to Ireland to a more secure and defensible site. The Pictish "Middle Kingdom" (so-called), that is, the Irish Iron Age Kingdom, which produced the Pictish "B" culture, flourished about 500 years during the last half of the Old Iron Age and throughout the whole period of the Middle Iron Age, about 750BC to 250BC. It was the successor-state of the Pictish so-called "Old Kingdom" at Aberffraw, Wales, that is, the Welsh Iron Age Kingdom, which had flourished during the first half of the Old Iron Age.

His epithet "Trigaranus" is thought to derive from the Greek word "trikarenos" meaning "three-cranes". He was the son of the Pictish heiress, or "throne-princess", and an Irish local chieftain in Meath of the Scythic Scoloti [Irish Scots], who were themselves recent arrivals in Ireland coming from the steppes of Central Asia. The successors of Tarvos in the Pictish sacral-kingship descended in the female-line from his sister, according to the matrilineal principle; while his male-line descendants from his son were the later chiefs of the Irish Scots. The Pictish Kings of Tara, Ireland, were supported by the Irish Picts, the Cruithni, who still made up the majority of the Irish population, and the non-Pictish tribes in Ireland had by this time long been "picticized" culturally and integrated into the Pictish political-system.

The sacral-kingship of the Picts at Tara was the first of at least three great monarchies to establish themselves there, that is, the Pictish, the Danaanian, and the Milesian. This was before the conquest of Ireland by the Gauls, or Gaels, about 250BC, who drove the Picts from Ireland to Scotland with a remnant remaining behind in Ulster, and gave Ireland a new language and culture. The Picts, now a vanished race, were a people culturally superior to the Celts, which is said so by the Celts themselves. In the course of time the Picts were partially "celticized" due to centuries of continuous Celtic influence, nevertheless, they were able to maintain themselves as a separate people nationally distinct and socially peculiar from the Celts.

The Celts gave their language [some loan words] to the Picts; while the Picts gave their religion, druidism, to the Celts. The language of the Picts, known only from ancient inscriptions, remains undecipherable to the present time. The Pictish language was still spoken as late as the time of Bede (late 7th/early 8th century AD), for Bede tells us that the Picts spoke a separate language. This tallies with the story of St. Columba (6th century AD) who needed an interpreter to communicate with the Picts. The druids, the priests of the Picts, not only continued their existence following the Celtic Conquest of the British Isles but also imposed themselves on the conquerors whom they converted to druidism.

Calgacus was enthroned in an ancient ceremony officiated by the druids in a chambered cairn on Moot Hill at Scone while seated upon the "Scone of Scone". Calgacus, of whom the Roman historian Tacitus wrote saying that he was a great warrior descended from "an ancient line of kings", united the tribes of Scotland to form a defence against the threat of the Roman advance. He fought several battles against the Romans but was ultimately defeated and probably killed in the Battle of Mons Graupius in AD83. The successors of Calgac[us], the first [New Iron Age] King of Albany, descended in the female line from his sisters, whose mother was a female-line descendant of the sister of Credne, the first [Late Iron Age] King of Scone, whose mother was a female-line descendant of the sister of Tarvos, the first [Middle Iron Age] King of Tara.

Her mother was a female-line descendant of the sister of Cruach, the first [Old Iron Age] King of Aberffraw, whose mother was the sister of Ogmios, the last Bronze Age King of Britain, whose mother was a female-line descendant of Andate, the sister-wife of Ampher, who was Britain’s first [Bronze Age] king, according to Plato, the Greek classic, who wrote that Ampher and his sister-wife Andate were the son and daughter of the sea-god Poseidon [equivalent to the Roman deity Neptune] and the mortal-woman Cleito [equivalent to the Roman deity Britannia, the island-goddess of Britain].  The introduction of Christianity was the most significant force of change during the early historic period.

The druids were particularly receptive to Christianity, for druidism bore certain uncanny resembles to Christianity among which was the belief of a messiah-figure or culture-hero. The druids erected an altar which they dedicated to The Virgin and Christ-Child and inscribed on it: “hinc druidae statuam in itimis penetralibus erexerunt, isidi seu virgini dedicantes, ex qua filius proditurus erat nempe generis humani remptor”. Legend says that the converted druid Dadera preached the gospel throughout the British Isles. He was a disciple of Joseph of Arimathea. Christianity in early Britain mixed with native pagan druidism as the heathen Picts carried many of their pagan beliefs and practices into their new religion.

Many attempts were made to harmonize druidism with Christianity in which Jesus became the British sun-god Eisu (Esus; Iesu) and was identified with the “dero” [culture-hero] of British Mythology, therefore, almost immediately the Picts relapsed back into paganism. Esus appears in a first-century AD relief dated circa AD 75 that was dedicated to Jupiter. The Romans reported that human-sacrifices were made to the British sun-god Esus (Iesu; Eisu) and that the victims were suspended from trees and ritually wounded and slain, probably in imitation of Jesus’ crucifixion. If the British god Esus pre-dates Christianity which some historians argue then when Christianity preached Jesus as God in Britain it thus preached to the Britons the name of one of their own deities, which if true would indeed be a curious coincidence.

The modern revival of druidism in recent times has few similarities with the ancient druidic religion, and appears to incorporate several wholly foreign cults. The concept of monarchy changed with the conversion to Christianity whereby the king ceased to be a god himself and instead became the representative of God as the "Lord’s Anointed". The sacrifices of the sacral-kings ceased as early as the first century AD then interpreted as typifying Christ’s Sacrifice, however, the animal-sacrifices continued to be made as memorials of Christ’s Sacrifice until as late as the sixth century when they were replaced with the Christian rite of the "bread and wine", that is, the "eucharist", or "Lord’s Supper", which also commemorates Christ’s Sacrifice. 

The Kingdom of Albany, usually called "Pictavia" to distinguish it from Albania, Albanacht, or Albion, flourished throughout the New Iron Age, the Roman Era, and the Early Middle Ages. The Kingdom of Albany was composed of seven local or provincial kingdoms whose kings all acknowledged the kings of Scone as high-king, who reigned nationally as the King of Albany. The seven provincial kingdoms were: (1) Fortrenn [Fortriu], corresponding roughly to Strathearn [= "Strath-Eireann", which is another name for Ireland] and Mentieth; (2) Athfotla [Foltlaid], now Athole; (3) Fidach, corresponding roughly to Moray, Ross, and Banff; (4) Fib [Fiobh], now Fife; (5) Cait, now Caithness, and included Sutherland too; (6) Ce, corresponding roughly to Marr and Buchan; and (7) Circinn [Cirech], corresponding roughly to Angus and Mearns.

Drust X was the last representative of the Iron Age Pictish Monarchy, which was itself the successor of the Bronze Age British sacral-kingship, that is, the original monarchy of Britain, not counting the Stone Age tribal British chieftainship, which undoubtedly surpasses in antiquity all of the world’s dynasties. The female-line of Cleito ["Mother Eve"], which was well over three thousand years old by then, snapped Year 848 as the matrilineal principle was eclipsed by the patrilineal principle with the end of the Pictish Monarchy.  There was a major suppression of Pictish culture, language, and heritage, at this time in a conscious effort by the Scots to eradicate Pictish nationalism. The Picts themselves did not cease to exist as individuals, after AD 848 they were forced to adopt Scottish culture which resulted in the loss of their identity, after two or three generations the Picts were completely absorbed by the Scots and became a mysterious people of the past.