Scottish heratige question

[saitaina]

I know I have Scottish friends somewhere...have a ball with this one.

Alright, if your family hasn't lived in Scotland since...say...fifteen hundred and some change...can you still wear your family tartan?

Comments

[titanic-days.livejournal.com]

Yes, but ...

The issue with tartans is that they were made illegal in 1746 because of their association with the Jacobite rebellion - exceptions were made for the gentry and military. When they were legalised again in 1782, a company called William Wilson & Sons of Bannockburn were the leading weaving manufacturer of military tartans. Wilson used 'agents' in the Highlands to get information and cloth samples from various clan districts and this enabled him to produce over 200 'genuine' tartans by 1822, many of which weren't very genuine at all for various reasons.

In 1815 the Highland Society of London requested that all the clans sent a sample of their tartan to London for authentication, but many people had no idea what their tartan actually was because the English had so successfully suppressed the old culture, so there were a large number of fakes, although the intention was not dishonourable. But by this time Macpherson's fictionalised 'Ossian' poems and Walter Scott's writings meant people were becoming very struck by these dashing Scottish romantic heroes and their clan tartans, and the fact that many of them weren't particularly genuine wasn't seen as much of a problem. For example, in a 1749 portrait John Campbell of Bank is pictured wearing a red tartan, but the current Clan Campbell tartan is green. In 1822 George VI visited Scotland, and pretty much an entire 'tradition' was invented for him. The concept of Scotland as it exists now is in many ways largely a result of rich Victorian Englishmen getting all gooey-eyed over their 'Celtic heritage.'

In terms of validity of tartans, there are no legal prohibitions against wearing a tartan that isn't 'yours' and the thing is there are so many of the damn things floating around that pretty much anybody can find one that has significance to them. The Royal Air Force and Royal Canadian Air Force have their own tartans, companies have their own tartans, football clubs have their own tartans, my university has one, even Amnesty International does. Then you have fashion tartans like Burberry that have no relevance to anything in particular.

The point is that to use tartans purely as a means of identifying clans is pretty much a redundant concept at this point in time. If you're a Campbell and you left Scotland whenever you did (probably not in the 1500s; we didn't have any colonies then) then you can wear the Campbell tartan with no problems, but then I can wear the Campbell tartan with no problems if I want, so you can see how the whole thing is pretty irrelevant.

So in answer to your question, yes, you can, but it doesn't really carry much cache.

[saitaina]

Thanks darling!

Now I just have to find out WHY William came over to what was to be America instead of staying in Scotland. I've always wondered since this area wasn't even a country yet. It was...whatever it was between 1500-1600.

[titanic-days.livejournal.com]

Well, it was lots of non-defined indigenous 'areas' I guess, wasn't it? What's your timescale here, 'cos you're going to find a few Brits wondering around the continental US during the 16th Century, but you're not going to find any colonies.

There's one theory I've always liked. In 1475, Britain lost fishing rights off Iceland's coast due to war, yet British cod stocks did not fall. When Iceland offered the British fishermen the chance to come back in 1490 (two years before Columbus sailed), the British declined, the presumption is that they'd discovered the cod rich waters off Newfoundland and didn't want anybody else to know about them. What is certain is that English fishing fleets were putting into bays up and down the north-eastern seaboard for at least 120 years before the Mayflower sailed to wait out harsh storms - so happily there's a perfectly conceivable reason for your character being in America before any colonies were established.

[saitaina]

Late fifteen hundreds, early sixteen. I'd have to look at my notes to get an exact date line.