For a short period Dunkeld played a leading role in the history of the early church in Scotland. We first hear of it in the middle of the ninth century when, in 849, it seems that King Kenneth son of Alpin had a part of the relics of St Columba brought here from Iona, at which time he made Dunkeld the administrative centre for Scotland’s ecclesiastical organisation. The reason for this move was probably that the small island of Iona was increasingly vulnerable to Norse raids, whilst Dunkeld, at the very heart of the recently united kingdoms of the Scots and the Picts, must have seemed a much safer place. It is therefore perhaps ironic that Dunkeld itself was to suffer a Danish raid soon after the move.

At this period the leaders of the Church in what was known as Fortriu (Pictish Scotland) were usually the heads of the monasteries rather than the bishops, although the first abbot of Dunkeld, whose death is recorded in 865, was also described as the chief bishop of the kingdom.

Before the mid tenth century St Andrews (then known as Kilrimont) had taken over as the headquarters of the Church, although Dunkeld continued to figure in the annals of the Kingdom, as in 965 and 1045, when two of its abbots were killed in battle. This may seem a strange fate for the heads of a religious house, but it is likely that by this time the abbot had come to be regarded more as a great officer of state than as spiritual leader of a religious community. Many of those who bore the title of abbot were married and may have had little to do with the day-to-day running of the community. Crinan, the abbot who was killed in 1045, was important enough to be married to a daughter of Malcolm II, and their son was to rule as Duncan I until he was killed by Macbeth in
1040.

The abbacy, or at least the income associated with it, continued to be regarded as a suitable perquisite for members of the royal family up to the eve of the great period of renewal in the Church in the eleventh and twelfth centuries. We know that Ethelred, one of the sons of Malcolm III (Canmore) and Queen Margaret, was both Earl of Fife and last abbot of Dunkeld.