When Were Kilts Allowed Again in England

Today, a homo's pride in his Scottish heritage is ofttimes asserted by wearing a kilt fabricated of his association tartan—a material woven with the specific plaid blueprint that is claimed past his family unit. You might assume with kilts being such an important piece of Scottish tradition that the clan tartans are several millennia one-time, or at least get dorsum to the Medieval Period. Simply you would be incorrect.

In fact, this misconception is so common that "Outlander" costume designer Terry Dresbach gets grief for failing to put the Idiot box testify'due south atomic number 82 Highlander, Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan)—a fighter in an 18th-century rebellion known equally the Jacobite Risings—in a Clan Fraser tartan kilt. On Elle.com, Dresbach explains she designed Jamie Fraser's tartan based on found dyes that would have been available in his homeland, which is more historically authentic than the colors now registered in official Fraser "sett," or pattern. The original kilts were loose-fitting, full-torso, and short-skirted garments, similar to Roman togas, that do, indeed, trace back to ancient times. And these then-called "bang-up kilts," exclusively worn by male warriors in the Scottish Highlands, were constructed out of a type of plaid, or checked, wool fabric that came to exist known as "tartan." Back then, the Scottish clans, or tribes, didn't have particular setts or colors that they claimed every bit their own.

Above: Scottish Tartans Authority historian Peter MacDonald wears a kilt in his handwoven reconstruction of the MacDonald of Glenaladale tartan. (Photograph credit: Chas MacDonald) Top: In "Outlander," Sam Heughan plays Jamie Fraser, a Scottish Highlander who fights in the concluding of the Jacobite Risings in 1745.

The first fourth dimension specific Scottish subgroups were identified by their tartan happened in 1739, when the British military began to organize violent Highlanders into regional fighting regiments that wore particular tartans equally role of their uniforms. However, it was some other 80 years before kilts became office of a pan-Scottish identity, and the gentry in the Lowlands began to scramble to define their own "clan tartans"—something they had never worn before. Almost of today's known clan tartans were invented by weavers and revisionist authors using fabricated "celebrated" sources in the early 19th century.

Regardless, at this point, these tartan traditions are most 200 years quondam. In 2008, the Scottish authorities established the Scottish Register of Tartans, which permit the clans—and other groups—brand their signature tartans official. But the true history of tartans, and what tin can exist ascertained by piecing together scraps and bits of fabrics from ancient Highland tribes, has been cataloged by the educational nonprofit Scottish Tartans Authorization, which keeps a database of nearly eight,000 known tartan patterns. Peter Eslea MacDonald, caput of the STA'due south Research & Collections partitioning, is an esteemed tartan historian who worked every bit a consultant on the 1995 Liam Neeson film "Rob Roy" and gave his adept stance in a BBC documentary about the writer Sir Walter Scott. He was kind enough to speak with Collectors Weekly over Skype and bust all our misconceptions about the history of kilts and tartans.

Liam Neeson every bit the titular graphic symbol in a still from the 1995 film "Rob Roy."

Collectors Weekly: Tin can you describe the earliest known kilt?

Peter Eslea MacDonald: Gosh. Right. It depends on what yous mean by "kilt." If y'all're pregnant the sewn garment as nosotros call up of it today, then we're talking about the early on 1800s. It was a much simpler garment in terms of structure and the corporeality of material compared with those that nosotros see today. It generally had anything from 3 1/2 to four yards of fabric in it, every bit opposed to seven-8 yards nowadays. That grade, the earliest dated example I know is a war machine kilt of 1794, which is in the National Museum of Scotland.

Before that, the kilt developed from a garment, "the belted plaid" or "peachy kilt," that, if y'all like, is the equivalent of a male sari, in that the garment included an upper portion that provided a cloak. The kilt'southward lower half became separated, probably in the commencement half of the 18th century, with what was known as the feileadh-beag, sometimes translated every bit "little kilt." When that first happened, information technology was unsewn. It was just gathered, and the garment was held in place past a drawstring or a belt.

A kilt worn past the 92nd Regiment of Foot, or the Gordon Highlanders, circa 1794. It was made from 3.v yards of material with 23 box pleats, button fastenings, and no lining. (©Peter Eslea MacDonald, Tartan Historian)

Collectors Weekly: And kilts were specifically associated with the Scottish Highlands?

"Information technology is a common misconception that tartan textile was banned in the Dress Act. It was not."

MacDonald: Yes, information technology was a Highlands costume, and information technology was associated with living an outdoor life. If yous call up of Roman and Greek warriors, they also wore a loose, flowing, pleated garment. When yous've got a poor population, a garment similar that is easy to construct, because it doesn't really require any sewing, and information technology's like shooting fish in a barrel to put on. It allows access to cantankerous the moors, where information technology's quite wet and boggy. The lower portions of your legs are constantly moisture, and you don't want them covered in wet material, so the kilt was very marsh-friendly. The Highland gentry used to wear what nosotros telephone call "trews," which were similar tartan hose, and that'due south considering they could afford horses and favored horse-riding.

Collectors Weekly: Before the 18th century, was the kilt fabricated of a plaid fabric, or what we now think of every bit a "tartan"?

MacDonald: Yep. Interestingly, the word itself, "tartan," is an old Castilian word that originally described a blazon of textile, irrespective of whether it had a pattern on it. Nosotros now think of tartan equally being multicolored—what the Americans call "plaid" by and large, we would call "tartan" over hither in Scotland and Europe. "Plaid" was the Scottish word for the garment, but you can meet how when Scottish people moved to the New World, and they talked about the garment they were wearing, their plaid, people would presume they meant the pattern. That'south why in N America, you lot have the utilise of "plaid" in identify of "tartan."

A private and corporal of a Highland Regiment, circa 1744. The private is wearing a belted plaid in the Government tartan. Notation how the plaid is existence used to protect the musket lock from rain and wind. (Via WikiCommons)

Collectors Weekly: How far back does the tartan or check design date?

MacDonald: The oldest surviving pieces are from a serial of burials in the Ürümqi desert, on the border of Mongolia. The mummies were proto-Celtic people, related to the Tocharians. The Celts, and thereby the Scots, came westward from the Caucasus Mountains, perchance five,000-vi,000 years ago. In Scotland, the oldest surviving piece is dated to a circa of 230 A.D., and that'south merely a elementary brown and unbleached white check.

Collectors Weekly: How were the "setts" or check patterns determined in the early days?

MacDonald: There were a number of things which would bear on them. You tin can see examples of complex patterns going right back to the bog burials in Kingdom of denmark. So yous accept the combination of the complexity of the pattern, and then the addition of color. The tradition in the Highlands is that the Gaels liked vivid colors, specially reds. Red was always an expensive dye. Starting from the early 18th century, if non slightly before, its principal source was an imported dyestuff, cochineal, which is a protrude, a shield insect. Therefore, if yous wore a tartan with a lot of red in it, you were making a social statement. Blood-red was the de rigueur colour across Europe at that fourth dimension because information technology was and then expensive.

The common people would take worn more bawdy, simple colors, possibly with some brighter stripes, rather than a tartan with a lot of red in it. Whereas, in about chiefs' portraits in the 18th century, they're painted wearing a lot of red, because they're making that social argument. It's the equivalent to "Tyrian royal" for the Romans.

"In the pop imagination, the old-time Highlander donned his plaid by placing his belt on the ground, pleating the plaid over it, then lying down on it and doing up his belt," wrote late tartan adept Jamie Scarlett. (Courtesy of the Scottish Tartans Authority)

Collectors Weekly: Were many of the dyes fabricated from things available to the people in their specific part of the Highlands?

MacDonald: They were, although a lot of the things that give you more ordinarily used dyestuffs are widespread throughout the Highlands, things like birch bark, oak bark, etc. They weren't necessarily restricted to a particular area. Weavers on Scotland'southward due west declension favored certain lichens, just those grew up and down the west coast. So you lot can't say they were from Skye or Ross-shire or something like that. Another imported dyestuff that was very popular was indigo. We've got records of indigo being imported to the Highlands from about 1600.

Collectors Weekly: Did women also wear tartan for the garment known as "earasaid"?

MacDonald: Aye, they did. And there's been a lot of discussion about what the earasaid looked like. In the tardily 1600s, when descriptions of earasaids compared them to male kilts, that course of clothes was being described as antique. Certainly by the early 18th century, the earasaid had developed into the "tartan screen," or shawl if you like, worn over more than contemporary European-style dresses. Then, there was an interesting period, starting around the 1730-'40s, where women of status started wearing all-tartan garments or tartan dresses.

A 19th-century illustration shows a woman in an earasaid, or arisaid, in a lachdan, or saffron-colored, fabric, and her son is depicted in the Clan Matheson tartan. This R.R. Mclan analogy appeared in James Logan's The Clans of the Scottish Highlands, published in full in 1845. (Via WikiCommons)

Collectors Weekly: How did the clan system piece of work?

MacDonald: We didn't have a feudal organization similar England did, but if you described it as something similar, you lot would be getting at that place. The clan organization was more than akin to the Native American tribe organisation, whereby you had people who claimed allegiance to and, in the broadest sense, membership of an enlarged family group. You had a patriarchal society in which the majority of the people descended from or owed fidelity to a chief. They paid for that service in what was called "manrent," meaning, effectively, if the chief wanted warriors, he called on them. It was a much more than socially cohesive style of living, rather than the straight feudal arrangement where the lord endemic a slice of land and everybody who lived there.

Detail from a 1758 painting showing a battalion of Black Watch recruits raised for service in Northward America beingness reviewed. (From the Black Watch Museum, via WikiCommons)

Collectors Weekly: Tin can y'all tell me a little about the Highlander war machine companies?

MacDonald: The Highland association system was a armed services-like system. So there were what we might term, "clan regiments." The British authorities saw the potential for the state of war-similar attributes of the Highlanders and so formed a number of contained Highlander war machine companies to go along club in the area. I estimate the equivalent in America would be the Minutemen during the American Revolution. In 1739, the first collection of the Highlander companies was organized into the British regiment of the line, which became the Black Watch. After that, gosh, between the private regiments and the sub-battalions, there were thousands upon thousands of men in probably 40 or 50 Highland regiments, from 1739 right through to today.

A swatch of the Black Watch tartan. (Via WikiCommons)

Collectors Weekly: Is that when specific tartans became associated with sure regiments?

MacDonald: Yeah, that started correct from the kickoff armed forces regiment, the Highland Regiment of Foot, in 1739. The regiment wore the Black Lookout tartan—sometimes that was known as the "Regime tartan." The early regiments used that tartan as a basis, and they might add together a red or a white stripe that tended to match what nosotros call the "facing," like the buttonholes, etc., on their coats. The Gordons or 92nd had yellow facings, then they added a yellow stripe in the Blackness Sentinel tartans, and so on.

Collectors Weekly: Who were the Jacobites and what were their Risings nearly?

MacDonald: Jacobite means supporter of James Francis Edward Stewart, or deposed Male monarch James 3 of England, also known as James Viii of Scotland. There were Jacobite Risings in 1708, 1715, 1719, 1745, and you could argue 1689, too. There was a series of Jacobite Risings over a period of about 50 years. Male monarch James' son, Charles Edward Stewart—also known as "Bonnie" Prince Charlie—was the leader and the figurehead for the concluding of the Jacobite Risings.

At that place are ii elements to the war. One, it was a religious split between those who followed Catholicism and those who were Protestants. Not all Jacobites were Catholics, but the principal leaders, like Charles Edward Stewart, were. Two, the Jacobites came from a tradition of divine correct of kings. And then a lot of it was about who had authority, whether information technology was the Male monarch or Parliament. The series of Risings were a fight between the Williamites, those supporters and descendants of William of Orangish, who were Protestant and was supported by Parliament, and those who supported the older, Jacobite organisation.

For a fourth dimension, no one was supposed to wear the Royal Stewart tartan without the express permission of the Queen of England. (Via WikiCommons)

Collectors Weekly: Were the British monarchs known as the Stewarts actually Scottish?

MacDonald: Originally, they were Scottish. They go right back to James Stewart, or James 6 of Scotland, who became James I of England and Wales under the Union of the Crowns in 1603. Because Elizabeth I had no children, when she died, they had to look around for someone to succeed her. James was related, so he was offered the crown. He was a Scot, and therefore, from him, descend all the Jameses, hence the Jacobites. If y'all go to what was called James III of England and James Eight of Scotland, he was built-in in England, but forced to flee with his male parent when he was nearly 7. His son, Bonnie Prince Charlie, was born in Rome.

Collectors Weekly: Can you tell me virtually the Apparel Act?

MacDonald: Colloquially, it was known as the Dress Act; it was actually office of the Deed of Proscription, "An Act for the more effectual disarming of the Highlands." It was the 3rd iteration of the Disarming Human activity, the offset of which came out in 1716, followed past a second in 1725. Afterward the concluding Rising in 1745, the British authorities added into the act a ban of all Highland wearing apparel, or what were called "Highland Dress," within a region of North Britain called Scotland, past which they meant the Highlands.

Information technology is a common misconception that tartan fabric was banned in the Wearing apparel Deed, simply it was not. That'southward a really important point, and you hear it once again and again and again, but tartan was not banned. The Act states that from this day along, which was the first of Baronial, 1747, "no Man or Boy, within that part of Great britain called Scotland, … shall, on any pretence whatever wear or put on the Clothes usually called Highland Wearing apparel [that is to say] the Plaid, Philabeg, or little Kilt, Trowse, Shoulder Belts, or any part whatsoever of what especially belongs to the Highland Garb; and that no Tartan, or party-coloured Plaid or Stuff shall exist used for Great Coats, or for Upper Coats."

So now, everyone's going, "See, it says 'tartan.'" No, it doesn't. Information technology talks virtually tartan Peachy Coats. And read between the lines: It says "no human or boy." Women weren't affected by the act, so they could go on wearing it. The Human action of Repeal of 1782, which lifted the ban, doesn't even mention tartan. Information technology just says you can now habiliment the kilt and the trews again and dress in the manly garb of your forefathers.

Co-ordinate to the enquiry that I've done, I have only found the assertion that tartan fabric was banned going back to about 1960, beginning with a paper that was written as a suffix to a book; the paper was actually on natural dyes. I call up that'due south where the misconception comes from. Equally, you will hear that bagpipes and Gaelic were banned by the act, but neither were banned either.

William Skeoch Cumming's 1894 painting, "The Royal Highland Regiment at Fontenoy, 1745" shows Highlanders in trews, or trousers, and kilts, all in the Blackness Watch tartan. (Via WikiCommons)

Collectors Weekly: Basically, it said you can't clothing your armed services garb in this detail region?

MacDonald: Right. The Highland wearing apparel was seen as identifying a strong cultural identity, so the act was designed to interruption up that clan system. Just this item blazon of outfit was too seen as synonymous with supporting the Jacobites, so the British said, "OK, you can't wear it, full terminate." Interestingly, information technology also practical to every man in the Highlands, even the 50 pct of the Highland population that fought or were sympathizers for the Government side. But the gentry, as they always exercise, managed to get away with information technology. And then there were quite a lot of portraits painted of gentlemen wearing Highland dress—really from about 1747, the year the Dress Act was brought in, right through for the next twenty years. These men were members of Parliament and all sorts of things. And so if you were wealthy enough, you could get away with it.

A group of Highland chiefs formed something called the Highland Society of London in 1778, and they began to agitate for the repeal of the Act of Proscription. They were successful in 1782, when information technology was lifted. At that place were a couple of other Highland Societies and Celtic Societies that followed on, but they were virtually exclusively manned past Highland gentry. It wasn't a pan-Scottish affair, so the Lowland gentry were non involved at all, really, until the George IV visit.

In 1765, Sir Joshua Reynolds painted John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore, in traditional Highlander wearing apparel, even though wearing such clothing was banned by the Act of Proscription in 1747. (Via WikiCommons)

Collectors Weekly: Subsequently this ban, the Jacobite struggle became romanticized?

MacDonald: It became romanticized, really, from the late 18th century, but particularly at the beginning of the 19th century. You had the novels of Sir Walter Scott, and y'all had George IV coming to Edinburgh in 1822, the first monarch to come to Scotland since Charles I in 1660. By the early 19th century, tartan had suddenly become, through the custodianship of Scott, a symbol of pan-Scottish identity, along with the kilt. Scott urged everybody in Scotland to turn out to see the king wearing their "truthful clan tartan." And everyone was running around saying, "Hmmm, what is my true association tartan?"

There was a very large and famous weaving business firm at the time, Wilsons of Bannockburn, which was producing all sorts of tartans just to meet need. We can run into a number of tartans, which are quite popular clan tartans today, that owe their origins or their names to that menses.

Sir Walter Scott first romanticized the Jacobite Risings in prose fiction in 1814'due south Waverley, a celebrated novel that became hugely popular in the United Kingdom.

Collectors Weekly: And then Sir Walter Scott made the Jacobite struggle seem heroic with his novel Waverley in 1814?

MacDonald: Yes, and he wrote Rob Roy (1817), and Red Gauntlet (1824), followed by a whole series of books, which were nearly, in one form or another, the Jacobite struggle. His novels were so popular that Wilsons of Bannockburn started producing a number of tartans using his character's names. They did a Rob Roy tartan, a Robin Hood tartan based on the character in 1820'due south Ivanhoe, a Merrilees tartan, based on the character from 1815's Guy Mannering. They also did Wellington and Waterloo tartans inspired past Scott's 1816 poem, "The Field of Waterloo." Wilsons even sold a Sir Walter Scott tartan. Wilsons would name a pattern afterward anything that would aid the tartan sell. You can look at the tartan industry as the exemplars of branding in the early on 1800s.

Collectors Weekly: Was George IV's 1822 visit to Scotland the moment when the concept of clan tartans really solidified?

MacDonald: I think if you were to selection a point, then that would be it. Because from effectually 1810, you get-go to see tartans having family names. But the fact that, in 1822, when Sir Walter Scott urged everyone to turn out to see the king in their tartan, y'all of a sudden had a whole load of Lowland lairds who had never worn tartan or the kilt needing to become one. So they were running around to Wilsons going, "Aid, help, what is my tartan?"

And I should say the Highland Gild of London in 1816 formed the commencement private collection of clan tartans, to which all the Highland chiefs submitted a sealed specimen of their tartan. In 1831, at that place was a book by a guy called James Logan, called The Scottish Gaël, in which he gave scales, or descriptions using thread counts, of a number of a quite a lot of tartans, which he obtained from Wilsons.

John Sobieski Stewart, who with his blood brother, Charles Edward Stewart, invented a number of clan tartans for their 1842 book, Vestiarium Scoticum. (Courtesy of the Scottish Tartans Authority)

"Prince Albert and Queen Victoria bought Balmoral Castle in 1848, and the whole dearest affair of Scottish schmaltz just went into overdrive."

Then, what came next in importance were the Sobieski Stewarts—John Sobieski Stewart and Charles Edward Stewart, who claimed to be descendants of "Bonnie" Prince Charlie—and their 1842 book, Vestiarium Scoticum, in which they invented a whole load of tartans for Lowland families similar the Humes and the Lauders. They said it was based on a 16th- or 17th-century manuscript, which was a chip similar the spectacles supposedly used by Mormonism founder Joseph Smith—no 1 ever saw or institute it. They'd say, "Yes, it exists," and every fourth dimension someone wanted to see it, like Sir Walter Scott, they'd say they'd sent information technology to someone else, and information technology was e'er lost in the post. The tartan history in the book is complete fabrication, but a lot of those tartans are pop clan tartans today. And they plainly have a history that goes back 175 years now. The 1842 inventions are traditional now, bearing in heed that 20 years earlier then, Wilsons was inventing or giving names to clan tartans.

In our Scottish Tartans Authority (STA) database, I've got something like 7,500-8,000 patterns, and we add together new ones every calendar week. But if you had said to me, "How many of those existed at the fourth dimension of the Jacobites?," the ones that survived that we know about are probably less than 50. The majority of those will not have association names, because they were not known past clan names at that time, although some may after take been adopted equally clan tartans. Near of them yous will not discover if you expect in a book on tartans, because the majority are taken from fragments and pieces that take been reconstructed.

Collectors Weekly: And then the concept of the association tartan was really embraced by both the weavers and the clans in the 19th century?

MacDonald: Correct. Sir Walter Scott, I recall, deliberately set out to heal some of the internal Scottish wounds and hatred, to some degree, between the Highlands and the Lowlands. Every bit I say, he developed this pan-Scottish identity. With Scott's help, Robert Burns became the bard of Scotland, fifty-fifty though he's got zip to practice with the Highlands, and the Highland dress became the Scottish national dress. Tartans became a Scottish family thing. Wilsons—and others after—just jumped on the bandwagon because it was a great marketing ploy, the company fabricated lots and lots of coin.

Not long after that, Prince Albert and Queen Victoria bought Balmoral Castle in Aberdeenshire, Scotland, in 1848, and the whole love matter of Scottish schmaltz just went into overdrive.

The exterior of Balmoral Castle in 2004. (Photograph by Stuart Yeates, via WikiCommons)

Collectors Weekly: When you lot await at images of Balmoral Castle, it looks similar Victoria and Albert used tartans for everything.

MacDonald: Absolutely. Everything from carpets and rugs to habiliment to bedspreads and upholstery to tartan-ware, which includes things like check-patterned boxes, dishes, and books. Around that time, a car called the Apograph—a pen-ruling system that could depict on paper very accurately—was developed. Tartans could then be formed around objects such as needle cases or vases, all sorts of things. Tartan-ware from the 1860s through to about the 1880s, is actually worth quite a lot of money if y'all get your easily on whatsoever.

Prince Albert leased and then purchased the Castle at Balmoral for Queen Victoria in 1848 and erected an even bigger castle there in 1856. The British royals covered the interior with tartan patterns. (Via BalmoralCastle.com)

Collectors Weekly: When did weavers like Wilsons outset have admission to chemical dyes?

MacDonald: 1856. That was the first chemical dye, Perkin's Imperial, which was a coal-tar dye, and from so onwards, various coal dyes, azo dyes, and aniline dyes were developed. I was commenting on something merely today on an online web log where someone had repeated, yet again, that with the advent of chemical dyes, you got more complex designs and more colors available to yous. That'southward complete rot. Dyes are a recipe, whether they're natural dyes or artificial dyes. You can have the same range of colors and shades, and therefore, the number and complexity of patterns. The STA has a tartan blanket that'southward dated 1748, although I think it's really dated to about 1770. It'southward got nine colors, including iv shades of ruby-red and ii shades of blue. It'due south quite exquisite. There are a number of 18th-century patterns which accept a tremendous range of colors and shades, that but disprove the belief we had to wait till aniline dyes to get the range of colors.

Modern asymmetric reconstruction of the Glenaladale sett. (©Peter Eslea MacDonald, Tartan Historian)

Collectors Weekly: When did the thought of having a hunting versus a apparel kilt come nigh?

MacDonald: The first hunting tartan was actually listed past Wilsons every bit the Hunting Stewart. I recollect it was neither "Hunting" nor "Stewart" in the way nosotros use the terms today. Really, the whole idea of the hunting tartan dates to the late 19th century. Around 1880 or so yous kickoff to meet a range of these hunting tartans, which are principally existing clan tartans with dark-brown in them replacing the blood-red.

Collectors Weekly: How practise people annals a tartan now?

MacDonald: Offset of all, they don't have to be registered. There are quite a lot of tartans that are designed, specially by the commercial merchandise, that don't get registered. And there are tartans designed all over the world. In Scotland, the Scottish Register of Tartans is the official authorities-sponsored repository where you register the tartans. Simply it doesn't accept every tartan, ironically. The Annals was only gear up upwards past an deed of Parliament in 2008, so they've only been recording tartans since so. They started with some of the STA's records, with some of those more mutual patterns equally a ground, and they've added almost one,500 since and then. Just they don't have the number that we've got or the more unusual patterns. A lot of my work is about restoring or preserving old specimens, etc., and those are the things which nobody is really interested in. Merely we keep them preserved, because if you like, they are the true tartans.

A Wilsons of Bannockburn sample book, circa 1830s-'40s. (©Peter Eslea MacDonald, Tartan Historian)

Collectors Weekly: Practise people in Scotland yet adhere to rules almost tartans?

MacDonald: Well, hmm, information technology depends what you mean by "rules." In Scotland, it is much more than common for people to cull a tartan with which they accept a family association. There's a younger element that won't, and there are quite a lot of popular fashion tartans, similar Pride of Bannockburn, and things similar this. And in that location are quite a number of fashion colorways going around at the moment, which are popular. In Scotland, people, if they own a kilt, they'll only take 1, generally. Whereas, if you become particularly to North America, you'll find a lot of people take as many every bit seven kilts. They wearable their kilts far more often than the people in Scotland do.

Because yous take a relatively immature country, everybody is ethnically from somewhere else. Scottish Americans volition host and wearing apparel up for Scottish nights very oft. I have some very good friends in Canada who meet every calendar week for Tartan Tuesday. I used to wear a kilt every mean solar day for quite a long time, only I don't at the moment. We Scots tend to wear kilts much more selectively, so it will be special occasions, because most of us accept jobs that do not naturally support wearing a kilt.

Tartan historian Peter MacDonald handweaving the MacDonald of Glenaladale tartan on a traditional unmarried box flying shuttle loom. (Photograph credit: EF Williams)

Collectors Weekly: Are the virtually famous tartans the Black Sentry and the Royal Stewart?

MacDonald: Those two are the most popular tartans, and they have been washed to expiry in pencil coverings and tins and all sorts of things. They're very reputable. You see them all over the place, right through to Vivienne Westwood. The punk scene, in item, used the Majestic Stewart. We've fifty-fifty got a piece of tartan that was taken to the moon. Subsequently denim, I would take to say that tartan is probably the almost popular fabric in the world.

Collectors Weekly: I'm certain you've seen the utility kilts.

MacDonald: Yes, they don't count. (Laughs)

Showtime in the 1970s, British punks adopted the Royal Stewart tartan, and others, without permission from the Queen. (Via Retro Store Dublin)

(For more information on clan tartans, kilts, and Highland dress, visit the Scottish Tartans Authorization web site and Peter MacDonald'due south professional site. If y'all buy something through a link in this commodity, Collectors Weekly may get a share of the sale. Learn more.)

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