Scotland has always done things its own way, and that is what makes the country's history so interesting. More than four thousand years ago, its Stone Age inhabitants were among the most advanced builders of Europe. About two thousand years ago, the Romans decided it was wiser to build a wall than attempt conquest. A thousand years ago, Scotland was one of the first medieval European kingdoms to emerge as a political unity from the Dark Ages. The decendants of those first Scots still inhabit the country. This original and immensely readable history charts the long, painful, sometimes tragic, often inspiring process that has formed the Scottish people of today. It reveals how the Scots' sense of nationhood has always been under test and how that pressure has shaped the ways in which they see themselves and are seen by others.