Scots archaeologists have been awarded nearly £1million to research the forgotten societies of north west Europe that emerged following the demise of the Roman Empire.

Experts say the nature of these "lost kingdoms" remains one of the relative unknowns of history.

The funding, from the Leverhulme Trust to the University of Aberdeen, will see archaeological excavations held in Scotland, Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland over the next five years.

The Leverhulme Research Leadership Award will enable the project to run over a five-year period and is worth a total of £971,149.

The project will be led by archaeologist Dr Gordon Noble, of the university's school of geosciences.

He said: "In contrast to the study of the Roman Empire and its successors, first-millennium AD northern Europe has not been studied to the same level and rarely within an international context.

"It is generally considered that in northern Britain and Ireland, the Roman presence had only been fleetingly felt and that these societies were less developed than those of the successor states of the Roman Empire, with a comparatively flat social and economic hierarchy and lacking in developed structures of power and governance.

"But increasingly, the archaeological and historical evidence can tell a different story of complex, highly stratified societies with developed strategies of rulership and governance and sophisticated seats of power."

Experts say there has been little study of how the societies that lived beyond the limits of the Roman world were transformed following the collapse of the empire in the 5th century AD.

Dr Noble and his team have already carried out excavations in Scotland at sites such as Rhynie in Aberdeenshire.

They found evidence which points to Rhynie being a sophisticated Pictish power centre of international significance, which enjoyed long-distance trade contacts with Anglo-Saxon England and the Byzantine world.

Areas to be studied in detail under the project include Burghead in Moray, Scotland; Cashel in County Tipperary, Republic of Ireland; and Dunseverick near the Giant's Causeway in County Antrim, Northern Ireland.

"Our work at Rhynie shows how even modest programmes of archaeological investigation can illuminate the seats of power of these early kingdoms," Dr Noble said.

"This grant will allow us to conduct more extensive field investigations of sites like Rhynie and to compare them to other early medieval seats of power in Scotland, Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland."

Professor Ian Diamond, principal and vice-chancellor of the University of Aberdeen said: "An archaeology programme at the University of Aberdeen was only established in 2007 and since then the discipline has gone from strength to strength.

"The department specialises in the 'archaeology of the North', a focus which is unique to Aberdeen, and we are delighted that Dr Noble and his team will be able to conduct cutting-edge research which will significantly enhance our understanding of the early societies of Northern Europe."