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The Cruthin (; or Cruithni; ) were a people of early medieval Ireland. Their heartland was in Ulster and included parts of the present-day counties of County Antrim, County Down and Londonderry. They are also said to have lived in parts of Leinster and Connacht. Their name is the Irish equivalent of * Pritanī, the reconstructed native name of the Celtic Britons, and Cruthin was sometimes used to refer to the Picts, but there is a debate among scholars as to the relationship of the Cruthin with the Britons and Picts.
The Cruthin comprised several túatha (territories), which included the Dál nAraidi of County Antrim and the Uí Echach Cobo of County Down. Early sources distinguish between the Cruthin and the Ulaid, who gave their name to the over-kingdom, although the Dál nAraidi would later claim in their genealogies to be na fír Ulaid, "the true Ulaid".Ó Cróinín 2005, pp. 182-234. The Loígis, who gave their name to County Laois in Leinster, and the Sogain of Leinster and Connacht, are also claimed as Cruthin in early Irish genealogies.Byrne 2001, pp. 39, 236.
By 773 AD, the annals had stopped using the term Cruthin in favour of the term Dál nAraidi, who had secured their over-kingship of the Cruthin.
It is suggested that Cruthin was not what the people called themselves, but was what their Exonym.
The name Cruthin survives in the placenames Duncrun (Dún Cruithean, "fort of the Cruthin") and Drumcroon (Droim Cruithean, "ridge of the Cruthin") in County Londonderry, and Ballycrune (Bealach Cruithean, "pass of the Cruthin") and Crown Mound (Áth Cruithean, "ford of the Cruthin") in County Down. These placenames are believed to mark the edges of Cruthin territory.
A certain Dubsloit of the Cruthin is said to have killed the son of High King Diarmait mac Cerbaill in 555 or 558, and Diarmait himself was killed by a Cruthin over-king of Ulster, Áed Dub mac Suibni, in 565.Byrne 2001, pp. 94-95.
In 563, according to the Annals of Ulster, an apparent internal struggle amongst the Cruthin resulted in Báetán mac Cinn making a deal with the Northern Uí Néill, promising them the territories of Ard Eólairg (Magilligan peninsula) and the Lee, both west of the River Bann in County Londonderry. As a result, the battle of Móin Daire Lothair (modern-day Moneymore) was fought between them and an alliance of Cruthin kings, in which the Cruthin suffered a devastating defeat. Afterwards the Northern Uí Néill settled their Airgíalla allies in the Cruthin territory of Eilne, which lay between the River Bann and the River Bush. The defeated Cruthin alliance meanwhile consolidated itself within the Dál nAraidi dynasty.
Their most powerful historical king was Fiachnae mac Báetáin, King of Ulster and effective High King of Ireland. Under their king, Congal Cláen, they were routed by the Uí Néill at Dún Cethirnn (between Limavady and Coleraine)Smyth 1989, p. 101 in 629, although Congal survived. The same year, the Cruthin king Mael Caích defeated Connad Cerr of the Dál Riata at Fid Eóin, but in 637 an alliance between Congal Cláen and Domnall Brecc of the Dál Riata was defeated, and Congal was killed, by Domnall mac Aedo of the northern Uí Néill at Mag Roth (Moira, County Down), establishing the supremacy of the Uí Neill in the north. In 681 another Dál nAraide king, Dúngal Eilni, and his allies were killed by the Uí Néill in what the annals call "the burning of the kings at Dún Cethirnn". The ethnic term "Cruthin" was by this stage giving way to the dynastic name of the Dál nAraide. The Annals record a battle between the Cruthin and the Ulaid at Belfast in 668, but the last use of the term is in 773, when the death of Flathruae mac Fiachrach, " rex Cruithne", is noted. By the twelfth century it had fallen into disuse as an ethnonym, and was remembered only as an alternative name for the Dál nAraide.O'Rahilly 1946, p. 345
The Pictish Chronicle names the first king of the Picts as the eponymous " Cruidne filius Cinge". Skene 1867, p. 5
Other scholars disagree. Historian Francis John Byrne notes that although in Irish both groups were called by the same name, in Latin they had different names, with Picti being reserved for the Picts.Byrne 2001, p. 8, 108. Professor Dáibhí Ó Cróinín says the "notion that the Cruthin were 'Irish Picts' and were closely connected with the Picts of Scotland is quite mistaken", while Professor Kenneth H. Jackson wrote that the Cruthin "were not Picts, had no connection with the Picts, linguistic or otherwise, and are never called Picti by Irish writers".Jackson 1956, pp. 122-166 There is no Archaeology evidence of a Pictish link and in archaeology the Cruthin are indistinguishable from their neighbours in Ireland.Warner 1991 The records show that the Cruthin bore Irish names, spoke Irish and followed the Irish derbfine system of inheritance rather than the matrilineality system sometimes attributed to the Picts.
Historian Alex Woolf suggested that the Dál Riata were a part of the Cruthin and that they were descended from the Epidii. Dál Riata was a Gaelic kingdom that included parts of western Scotland and northeastern Ireland. The Irish part of the kingdom was surrounded by Cruthin territory.
Historians, archaeologists and anthropologists have widely rejected Adamson's theory. Prof. Stephen Howe of the University of Bristol argues it was designed to provide ancient underpinnings for a militantly separate Ulster identity. Historian Peter Berresford Ellis likens it to Zionism. Archaeologists such as J. P. Mallory and T. E. McNeil note that the Cruthin are "archaeologically invisible"; there is no evidence of them being a distinct group and "there is not a single object or site that an archaeologist can declare to be distinctly Cruthin"; they further considered Adamson's claims "quite remarkable".
Much of Adamson's theories are based on the historical model put forward by Irish linguist T. F. O'Rahilly in 1946. Where Adamson differs is his claim that the Cruthin or Priteni were pre-Celtic as opposed to Celts themselves. However, this model has since been refuted by authors such as Kenneth H. Jackson and John T. Koch. There is a lack of archaeological evidence for O'Rahilly's theory, and it was conclusively shown to be false in the landmark 2017 publication of the "Irish DNA Atlas", which sets out in great detail the genealogical history and modern day makeup of the British Isles.
The asteroid 3753 Cruithne was named after the group. Cruithne: Asteroid 3753 . Western Washington University Planetarium. Retrieved January 27, 2011.
Robert E. Howard's pulp hero Bran Mak Morn was characterised as "chief of the Cruithni Picts".Howard, Robert E. (2005-05-31). Bran Mak Morn: The Last King (Kindle Locations 3037-3039). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.
Modern politics and culture
In the 1970s, Unionist politician Ian Adamson proposed that the Cruthin were a British people who spoke a non-Celtic language and were the original inhabitants of Ulster. He argues that they were at war with the Irish Gaels for centuries, seeing the story of the Táin Bó Cúailnge as representing this; and argues that most of the Cruthin were driven to Scotland after the Battle of Moira (637), only for their descendants to return 1,000 years later in the Plantation of Ulster. Adamson suggests that the Gaelic Irish are not really native to Ulster and that the Ulster Scots have merely returned to their ancient lands.
His theory has been adopted by some Ulster loyalism and Ulster Scots activists to counter Irish nationalism, and was promoted by elements in the Ulster Defence Association (UDA). They saw this new 'origin myth' as a way to justify their presence in Ireland and the partition of the country.
Sources
(2025). 9780199539703, Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780199539703
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