Scone (; ; ) is a town in Perth and Kinross, Scotland. The medieval town of Scone, which grew up around the monastery and royal residence, was abandoned in the early 19th century when the residents were removed and a new palace was built on the site by the Earl of Mansfield. Hence the modern town of Scone, and the medieval settlement of Old Scone, can often be distinguished.

Both sites lie in the historical province of Gowrie, as well as the old county of Perthshire. Old Scone was the historic capital of the Kingdom of Scotland. In the Middle Ages it was an important royal centre, used as a royal residence and as the coronation site of the kingdom's monarchs. Around the royal site grew the town of Perth and the Abbey of Scone.

Scone and Scotland

Scone's association with kings and king-making gave it various epithets in Gaelic poetry; for instance, Scoine sciath-airde, "Scone of the High Shields", and , "Scone of the Noisy Shields".Skene (1867), pp. 84, 97. Scotland itself was often called or shown on maps as the "Kingdom of Scone" (or "Sconiana"), .Skene (1867), p. 21. Similarly, Ireland was often called the "Kingdom of Tara"; Tara, like Scone, was a ceremonial inauguration site.See, for instance, Skene (1868–70), p. 88. Scone was therefore the closest thing the early Kingdom of Scotland had to a capital city. In either 1163 or 1164 King Malcolm IV described Scone Abbey as , "in the principal seat of our kingdom".Barrow (1960), no. 243. By this point, however, the rule of the King of the Scots was not confined to the Kingdom of Scotland, which then only referred to Scotland north of the river Forth. The king also ruled in Lothian, Strathclyde and the Honour of Huntingdon, and spent much of his time in these localities too. Moreover, the king was itinerant and had little permanent bureaucracy, so Scone's role was totally unlike that of a modern capital city. But in the medieval sense Scone can in many ways be called the "capital of Scotland", and was often referred to as "the Royal City of Scone". Many comparisons can be drawn between the City of Westminster and the "City" of Scone. Both were medieval centres of royal power. Both were located beside crossing points of major rivers – the highways of the medieval period – and in geographic locations central to their respective kingdoms.

The origins of a settlement of any kind at Scone are unknown, although thought to be early medieval. The origins could pre-Roman, as there is much evidence of a well-established and sophisticated Iron Age people flourishing in this part of Scotland. Direct evidence however is lacking and so Scone's story is thought to begin in the wake of the Roman exit from Scottish history. Thus there may have been a village, a religious centre, or even a seat of power based at Scone from as early as the 5th century AD, with Scone coming into real and recorded prominence in the 9th century during the amalgamation of the Pictish and Gaelic peoples and kingdoms. Scone at this point played a crucial role in the formation and governance of the ancient Kingdom of Scotland. In the 9th century Kenneth MacAlpin came east to Scone, bringing with him a holy relic and coronation stone. As the stone was kept at Scone, it acquired the name, the Stone of Scone. In the 12th century, various foreign influences prompted the Scottish kings to transform Scone into a more convincing royal centre. Many historians have argued that the monastery or priory was founded specifically in 1114 by Alexander I of Scotland. This is strictly speaking correct, but it seems clear that this charter was simply a reaffirmation of Scone's status, and of the religious institutions there, rather than a sudden founding or establishment. There is growing evidence that there had been an early Christian cult called the Culdees based at Scone dating from at least the 9th century and possibly earlier. The Culdees were eventually merged with the Augustinian canons who arrived from Nostell Priory in Yorkshire as part of the 1114 "re-establishment". This "re-establishment" and drive to confirm Scone's status at the heart of the emerging Scottish kingdom and nation continued in 1124 when Alexander I of Scotland wrote to "all merchants of England" () promising them safe passage and protection if they bring goods to Scone by sea to trade.Lawrie (1905), p. 43. Scone at this time lay on a navigable part of the river Tay. This was at times a major disadvantage, as the Vikings came across the North Sea to launch their lightning raids. Using the River Tay as a water route into the heart of Scottish held territory throughout the 9th and 10th centuries, these raiders pillaged towns and villages as well as religious houses such as the abbey at Dunkeld. In 904 a battle was fought in the vicinity of Scone, often referred to as the Battle of Scone, between the Scots led by King Constantine II of Scotland and the Vikings. As time went on, for various reasons the river by Scone became less navigable. At the same time ships were developing deeper hulls. It was this combination of factors that encouraged David I of Scotland to establish a new burgh at the nearest suitable location downstream of Scone, namely Perth.Spearman (1988), p. 47; Lawrie (1905), p.296. Perth lies from the site of medieval Scone, which is similar to the distance of Westminster Abbey from the City of London: .

King Alexander I, thus "re-established" an Augustinian priory at Scone sometime between 1114 and 1122. In either 1163 or 1164, in the reign of King Máel Coluim IV, Scone Priory's status was enhanced and it became an abbey.Cowan & Easson (1976), pp. 97–98. The abbey had important royal functions, being next to the coronation site of Scottish kings and housing the coronation stone, the Stone of Scone, until King Edward I of England stole it during the Wars of Scottish Independence in 1295. Like other Scottish abbeys, Scone probably doubled up as a royal residence or palace as well as a hunting ground. Scone Abbey's obvious role was like that of Westminster Abbey for the Kings of England, although it appears that Scottish coronations were a more pagan ceremony, including the use of the Moot Hill (the coronation mound). It is likely that Scottish inaugurations and coronations were completed in two parts: a Christian ceremony conducted within the Abbey church and the perceivably pagan (Gaelic) ceremony upon the Moot Hill. This can be attributed, as Thomas Owen Clancy points out, to the importance in Gaelic tradition of swearing the inauguration oath , on the traditional mound; the importance of which continental Christian fashions were apparently unable to overcome.Clancy (2003), p. 103. But the parallel with Westminster certainly existed in the mind of Edward I, who in 1297 transferred the Abbey's coronation relics, the crown, sceptre and the stone, to Westminster in an overt act of stripping Scotland of her nationhood. Scotland's national relics and regalia were gifted to Westminster Abbey in honour of the English royal saint, Edward the Confessor.Barrow (2003), p. 201.

Traditional coronation site

Like Tara, Scone would have been associated with some of the traditions and rituals of native kingship, what D. A. Binchy describes as "an archaic fertility rite of a type associated with primitive kingship the world over".Binchy (1958), p. 134. Certainly, if Scone was not associated with this kind of thing in Pictish times, the Scottish kings of later years made an effort to do so. By the thirteenth century at the latest there was a tradition that Scone's famous inauguration stone, the Stone of Scone, had originally been placed at Tara by Simón Brecc, and only taken to Scone later by his descendant Fergus mac Ferchair when the latter conquered Scotland.Broun (2003), p. 194. Indeed, the prominence of such a coronation stone associated with an archaic inauguration site was something Scone shared with many like sites in medieval Ireland, not just Tara.See FitzPatrick (2003). Such "unChristian" rites would become infamous in the emerging world of Scotland's Anglo-French neighbours in the twelfth century.e.g. O'Meara (1951), p. 110.

Scone's role therefore came under threat as Scotland's twelfth century kings gradually became more French and less Gaelic. Walter of Coventry reported in the reign of William I of Scotland that "The modern kings of Scotland count themselves as Frenchmen, in race, manners, language and culture; they keep only Frenchmen in their household and following, and have reduced the Scots to utter servitude."Stubbs (1872), p. 206. Though exaggerated, there was truth in this. Apparently for this reason, when the Normanized David I of Scotland () went to Scone to be crowned there in the summer of 1124, he initially refused to take part in the ceremonies. According to Ailred of Rievaulx, friend and one time member of David's court, David "so abhorred those acts of homage which are offered by the Scottish nation in the manner of their fathers upon the recent promotion of their kings, that he was with difficulty compelled by the bishops to receive them."Anderson (1908), p. 232; Ailred was keen to portray David as a good Anglo-Norman, and was anxious to relieve David of anti-Scottish prejudice being made to debase his image in the Anglo-Norman world. Inevitably then this was bound to affect the significance of Scone as a ritual and cult centre, yet the inauguration ceremony was preserved with only some innovation through the thirteenth centuryBannerman (1989); for some of the innovations, see Duncan (2003). and Scottish kings continued to be crowned there until 1651, when Charles II became the last King of Scotland to have a coronation there (see List of Scottish monarchs).James II of Scotland was not crowned there, but at Holyrood Abbey; he was however a child, and there were political problems which made Scone too dangerous. His son James III of Scotland, who succeeded as a child also, was not apparently crowned there either; however, these coronations did not reverse the ancient precedent, which was "revived" by James IV of Scotland. Moreover, until the later Middle Ages kings continued to reside there, and parliaments, often some of the most important parliaments in Scottish history, frequently met there too.See McNeill & MacQueen (1996), pp. 159–182, for places of charter issue.

In 2007, archaeologists discovered the footprint of the medieval abbey allowing us to envisage where the high altar was and thus where relics such as the Stone of Scone or Stone of Destiny were housed, and where Kings of Scots such as Macbeth and Robert the Bruce were crowned before heading up to the Moot Hill for the more pagan elements of their inaugurations.

Later history