Howard once wrote "... my interest in the people which , for the sake of brevity , I have always designated as Picts . I am , of course , aware that my use of the term might be questioned ..... to me , " Pict " must always refer to the small dark Mediterranian aborigines of Britain ." he also states in " The Hyborian Age " that eventually the Pictish wilderness was swallowed by the sea and the western mountains of Cimmeria ( right next door ) became the British Isles . It would make sense that the Picts would flee here , hence the historical Picts of Britain . He also mentions that the ancient Etruscans had Pictish blood and these gave rise to the Romans . And yes , the Cimmerians eventually drifted westward and overthrew the Picts . The newly formed islands that would become Britain were now the most westerly point of what had been the Hyborian Age continent , so I presume the Cimmerians got this far and settled to become the Britons ( although he also states that this name is derived from Brythunian ) , but it would make sense that pockets of Picts would survive in the wilderness to become their later namesakes .
Obviously , trying to integrate a fictional history with real world history is bound to lead to some contradiction and confusion , but I thnk Howard deserves credit for doing it as well as he did .
Personally , I think Howard just liked the name and the romantic image of untameable savages it conjured and threw it in the mixing pot . A lot of his fiction re-uses names that he likes and this can be confusing . Also his views of other races were not always good and I think the idea of Native Americans as savages was still popular in a lot of places at his time , hence the NA associations in pictish names and behaviour .
"Phew" , I think I need to go for a lie down now .
( By the way , the quote above is from the Introduction to " Bran Mak Morn ")
