Irish Dress
Hibernian dress, Caledonian Custom
a brief history of Irish kilts &
tartans
By
Matthew Newsome & Todd Wilkinson
While the traditional tartan kilt is seen generally as an icon of
Scottish culture, many people, especially Americans of Irish
heritage, also associate the garment with Ireland as that nation's
"traditional dress". The Internet has only heightened this
misconception with all sorts of claims for an ancient pedigree for
the kilt & tartan cloth. It is our hope that this brief article
will help set the record straight in terms of the origins of the
kilt as an Irish garment, as well as the association of tartan with
the Emerald Isle.
THE IRISH KILT
In his book Life & Tradition of Rural
Ireland, Timothy O'Neill discusses the idea of the kilt as
a form of Irish national dress. Like other noted scholars such as
Henry McClintock and Kass McGann, O'Neill establishes the origin of
the Irish kilt at the end of the 19th century in the so-called
"Gaelic Revival" movements which attempted to create a distinct
Irish culture to separate themselves from their English
overlords.
Suffice to say that most scholars of Irish dress agree that the
kilt is not part of traditional Irish dress, nor does it have a
pedigree in the mists of Irish antiquity. The kilt was adopted by
some (but certainly not all) Irish nationalists at the end of the
19th century in an attempt to counteract the Anglicization of
Ireland, which had been going on for hundreds of years before. At
the end of the 19th century, a "Gaelic Revival" of sorts began to
take place in Ireland as a reaction to British rule. Besides the
effort to restore the Irish language, the revival also sought to
restore "traditional" Irish culture in many forms, including
sports, literature, song and dress. In 1893, for example, the
Gaelic League was organized, with Douglas Hyde as its first
president. The League's goal was to preserve Irish as the national
language, and to study Gaelic literature, both ancient and
modern.
About 10 years before the formation of the Gaelic League, the
Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) was founded by Michael
Cusack to provide an Irish alternative to traditional English
sports such as cricket, rugby and polo. While both the League and
the GAA were nominally apolitical, both groups began to attract
Irish Nationalists of all stripes. And in both organizations, we
find individuals looking for the adoption of an Irish "national
dress". (Bottigheimer, pp. 212-214).
But who is responsible for the myth of the Irish kilt? Noted
scholar Henry McClintock believes that the idea may have originated
with one Eugene O'Curry, Professor of Irish History in the Catholic
University of Ireland, who first proposed the idea of the Irish
kilt in ancient times in his 1860 Manners and Customs of
the Ancient Irish. McClintock also mentions "a well-known
antiquarian", Patrick Weston Joyce, who strongly advocated
O'Curry's claims in his Social History of Ancient
Ireland, which was published in 1903. Kass McGann cites
McClintock's claim that Joyce mistranslated the word "Leine", in
reference to an ancient Irish shirt, as "kilt", in her article
"Proof against the Existence of an Irish Kilt".
In his Old Irish and Highland Dress, McClintock
states his belief that it was Joyce's book that put the idea of an
Irish kilt firmly in the minds of many, as the book was "widely
read and carried much weight at the time." (McClintock, 123)
Indeed, McClintock believes that it was Joyce that inspired Irish
pipe bands to adopt the saffron kilt (which was also mentioned in
James Joyce's Ulysses). McClintock is quick to suggest that those
who took Joyce and O'Curry at their word were not to be blamed, as
they had "what seemed to be ample authority" for adopting the kilt
as a form of Irish dress. Who were these individuals that adopted
the kilt? One was Sir Shane Leslie of County Monaghan. Born in
1885, John Randolph Leslie came from a prominent Anglo-Irish
family, and attended Eton and King's College, Cambridge, where he
converted to Roman Catholicism, taking the Gaelic name Shane.
Leslie became a devoted Irish nationalist as well as Roman
Catholic, and adopted the "traditional" Irish saffron kilt, and
began a personal campaign to urge the adoption of it in 1906,
according to Janet and Gareth Dunleavy's biography of the Gaelic
League's founder, Douglas Hyde. (p. 317)
A description of Leslie in an article in Time Magazine in
February, 1957 describes him as cutting a "glorious Irish
swathe through London on his visits, tricked out in mutton-chop
whiskers, cockaded tam-o-shanter, green kilt and dagger in the
stocking."
Another kilt-wearing Irish nationalist aristocrat was William
Gibson, 2nd Baron Ashborne. Like Leslie, Ashborne had been educated
at Oxford and Trinity College in Dublin (known for its strong
Unionist sympathies). When Ashborne was first admitted to the House
of Lords in May, 1913, the New York Times reported that there was
great curiosity if he would wear his saffron kilt to Westminster.
Such an act might have caused an incident, as some months before,
the House of Commons refused to admit an Irishman to the stranger's
gallery because he was wearing a kilt. (May 1913). When his father,
Edward Gibson, 1st Baron Ashborne, died that same year, the New
York Times reported that he received only $4,000 from his father's
estate because "he is an enthusiastic Nationalist, wears the
ancient Irish dress, and is a convert to Catholicism." (July
22, 1913).
Another nationalist, who was later killed in the Easter Uprising
of 1916, Eamonn Ceannt, wore a kilt when playing the uileann pipes
during an audience with the Pope in 1908. (O'Neill, p. 44) Indeed,
kilts were quickly adopted by a number of pipers and pipe bands in
Ireland in the days before the First World War. Several of these
bands are still in existence, including the Black Raven Pipe Band,
the St. Laurence O'Toole Pipe Band and the Youghal Pipe Band. Many
of these pipe bands were formed during the renewal of the national
game of hurling, as part of the larger "Gaelic Revival" In the case
of the Black Raven Pipe Band, it was in connection with the Naomh
Mac Cullen Hurling Club of Fingal. According to the band's web
site, a pipe band that accompanied a rival club from County Armagh
made quite the impression on a club member - school teacher
Thomas Ashe, who soon acquired a set of pipes and began to teach
himself how to play. In 1910 Ashe began to organize a band and
recruit new members and he contacted the noted Belfast antiquarian
Mr. F J Bigger to assist with the design of the band's uniform,
which included the kilt.
In 1911, the band paraded for the first time with its new uniform,
which included two versions. The first one was a black tunic, green
kilt and white plaid shawl. The second uniform was white tunic,
saffron kilt and black plaid shawl. The band marched under a
reproduction of the Black Raven flag, said to have been captured by
the forces of King Brian Boru from the Danes at the Battle of
Clontarf in 1014. The band competed against a number of rival bands
in national competitions until 1916, when several of the members
joined the Easter Rebellion against British rule. The founder,
Thomas Ashe, would die as a result of a hunger strike in prison in
1917.
The history of the Youghal Pipe Band, founded in 1914 by one Danny
McCarthy, may have something to tell us about the adoption of the
kilt by Irish pipers and nationalists. Youghal, in County Cork, had
long been a garrison town for units of the British Army stationed
in Ireland; the band's history reports that McCarthy "would
watch the Pipe Bands of the British Army parade their Regiments
down Cork Hill and out to the train station every couple of
months," and would also go to the barracks to listen to the
bands. Eventually he organized the formation of the Cork Hill Pipe
Band, which later renamed itself after the town of Youghal.
McCarthy and several members of the band were members of the Irish
Volunteers, a Nationalist paramilitary force which later became the
Irish Republican Army during the Anglo-Irish War of 1919-1922. Pipe
bands became an important recruiting tool for Nationalist forces;
in a biography of IRA leader Terence MacSwiney, Moirin Chavasse
discusses how a pipe band was used in October, 1915 as part of a
recruiting drive for the Volunteers. (Terence MacSwiney, p.35). IRA
pipe bands even had yearly competitions; The Cork Volunteer Pipe
Band was named as the "Prize Pipe Band" in competitions held in
Killarney (1918), Cork (1918-1919) Dublin (1920) and Wexford
(1922), according to information on the personal genealogical web
site of Bryan Wickham. Wickham's father, Michael, later immigrated
to the United States, where he joined the New York Corkmen's
Society Pipe Band.
(http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~bwickham/index.htm)
At least one suggestion was made in 1914 for all members of the
Irish Volunteers to wear the kilt; in the organizations' newspaper
of February 14 of that year, one William Royce called for the
adoption of the kilt by the volunteers, saying that the only
objections to such a move would "come from the skinny-legged,
knick-kneed type for whose faulty or undeveloped 'understandings'
the pants as a covering are a veritable Godsend." (Kelly, p.
219). The most famous Irish nationalist associated with the kilt,
however, is Patrick Pearse. Like many members of the Gaelic League
and the larger Celtic Revival, Pearse (himself the son of an
Englishman) sought to distance himself from all things English.
Pearse joined the Gaelic League in 1905 and soon took an interest
in the Irish educational system. Concerned that Irish children,
especially boys, were losing their "Irish" identity in an
English-dominated school system, Pearse used his life-savings and
borrowed funds to form St. Enda's School for Boys in 1908. The
school offered a bilingual education in English and Gaelic, as well
a curriculum in "traditional" Irish culture.
As part of his attempt to restore "Irishness" to the educational
system, Pearse wished to adopt "traditional" Irish dress. After
viewing a pair of trews, coat and cloak found at Killery in County
Sligo, which dates to the early seventeenth century, Pearse wrote
to John O'Kelly in October 1900 about his ideas on a potential
Irish national dress to be worn at a Gaelic League Feis, or Irish
cultural festival: "Frankly I would much rather see you arrayed
in a kilt, although it may be less authentic, than in a pair of
these trews. You would, if you appeared in the latter, run the risk
of leading the spectators to imagine that you had forgotten to don
your trousers and sallied forth in your draws. This would be fatal
to the dignity of a Feis. If you adopt a costume, let it, at all
events, have some elements of picturesqueness."( Dunlevy, p.
176).
Pearse eventually did adopt a saffron kilt as a uniform for the
boys of St. Enda's, suggesting to parents that the kilt was
"economical, hygienic, and [a] becoming costume for boys" as well
as a "distinctly national form of dress."
(http://www.somebody.to/pp.htm) Pearse also recommended that the
garments be Irish made, and directed parents to purchase them at
Messrs. M. Meers and Co. of 10 Lower Pembroke Street, Dublin. What
did the boys of St. Enda's think about the kilt? In his memoir
Dublin Made Me, C.S. "Todd" Andrews discusses his
personal thoughts on Pearce's "national dress". Andrews was
relatively unaware of Irish culture or nationalism when he came to
St. Enda's, and offered interesting insights about the school
uniform: "A number of the boys in St Enda's wore kilts. This
they probably hated doing and for that reason were all the more
ready to resent derogatory remarks about them - remarks which no
Dublin boy could resist making and I made them. Between the
language, the games and the kilts, I seemed to be always involved
in quarrels and was thoroughly unhappy in a situation for which I
had no remedy. It would never have occurred to me to complain to
the teacher.
All schoolboys not accepted by the group are unhappy. My
problem was that I did not want to be accepted by the group. I
despised them and, from their point I was a 'stinker'. I did not
want to talk Irish, I did not want to play hurling or Gaelic
football and I thought kilts were funny. I had only one friend, a
London-Irish boy who did not know or want to know Irish any more
than I did, who disliked all games and tried to avoid them, and who
thought that kilts should be worn only by Scots
Highlanders."
(Irish Kilt Society Newsletter, No. 11, November 2004, p. 2)
Several photos of St. Enda's students wearing kilts still exist;
one of the most famous shows a group of students engaged in
military drill with their instructor, Conn Colbert, who served as
physical fitness master for the school. All of the students and
Colbert are kilted; the boys wear school jumpers while Colbert
wears a brass-buttoned jacket, the official uniform of the Fianna
Eireann, the Irish Nationalist Boy Scout organization formed by The
Countess Markiewicz in 1909 and named for the ancient Irish
warriors lead by the legendary Fionn mac Cumhaill. (Sisson, pp.
125-127).
While kilts were not widely adopted by the Irish, they continued
to be worn by pipe bands in the years following the Anglo-Irish War
and the Irish Civil War of the early 1920s; kilt-clad pipers could
be found among the Garda Síochána (The Irish Police) and
the Irish Defense Forces, as well as among civilian Irish dancers.
Even today, the Irish Army and Air Corps maintain pipers in a
similar vein to the pipers of the Scottish Regiments of the British
Commonwealth. Irish pipers continue to accompany Irish soldiers on
United Nations Peacekeeping missions, and their pipes have been
heard in such locations as the Congo, Cyprus and Lebanon. Of
course, not all approved of the adoption of the kilt by Irish
pipers. In his Irish Minstrels and Musicians,
Francis O'Neill, the noted collector of traditional Irish music
& Chicago Police Officer, stated in relation to the popularity
of the "Scotch" warpipe in Irish circles: "When very young I
learned that there was no royal road to Euclid, but there seems to
be a royal road to Irish piping. A fellow has only got to get a set
of warpipes, hang a kilt around his middle, and throw a bedgown
over his shoulders, and he decomes an Irish piper.
(p.478).
Ironically, at the same time that some in the Nationalist
community were adopting the kilt, Irish Regiments of the British
Army were also seeing pipers in saffron kilts in their ranks. An
article from the April 29, 1900 edition of the New York Times
discussing the Boer War, mentions a motion in Parliament to kit out
the newly-raised Irish Guards regiment in kilts. The article does
not take a kind view of such a measure, mentioning the reports from
South Africa of the "suffering of the bare-legged Highlanders
and of the sorrows attached to this out-of-date
uniform." The article also criticized the aforementioned
Baron Ashborne and his attire, as well as Queen Victoria's decision
in 1900 to allow Irish regiments to wear the Shamrock on St.
Patrick's Day (a custom which continues to present day). The
so-called "Shamrock craze", as the author refers to it, was simply
another failure of the English people to "grasp the nature of
Ireland's needs".
Between the end of the Boer War in 1902 and the First World War, a
number of Irish regiments began to add pipers to their muster
rolls; in 1909, the Leinster Regiment's Regimental Journal
reported: "The pipers have no distinctive features of dress.
They wear dark blue forage caps with scarlet welt band. Their
scarlet tunics have white pipe scarlet shoulder straps bearing the
regimental title in white embroidery and white piped dark blue
collar and cuffs." (Harris, The Irish Regiments 1683-1999,
201). The journal also gave a description of the first public
appearance of the Leinster's pipers on St. Patrick's Day of that
year; again, no mention was made of kilts at all; however, a photo
dated 1919 of the Colonel-in-Chief of the regiment, HRH the Prince
of Wales presenting decorations to the men of the 2nd Battalion of
the Leinsters shows a Piper J. Fagan clad in a kilt with Scottish
style tam-o-shanter. (Harris, p. 202).
In another photo from Harris's The Irish Regiments
1683-1999, two pipers of the 5th Battalion Donegal
Militia, Royal Inskilling Fusiliers (taken in Dover in 1901 when
the battalion was preparing to depart for South Africa) are again
clad in full-dress scarlet tunic and blue trousers; not a kilt or
caubeen in sight. The only odd bit of kit are khaki slouch hats in
the Australian style. Both Harris and David Murphy's Irish
Regiments in the World Wars (Osprey Publishing, 2007) tend
to agree that the adoption of saffron kilts by Irish regimental
pipers seems to come during the First World War, and before the
official authorization of pipers for said regiments. The Irish
Guards received their pipers in 1916, and a photo from that year
shows the more traditional Irish pipers kit, including saffron
kilt. By the end of the First World War, and in to the 1920s, the
"traditional" Irish pipers uniform became fully authorized - in
1927, the Royal Inskilling Fusiliers pipers uniforms contained "as
many of the distinctive features of the regiment and ancient Gaelic
costumes and decorations as possible." Of the kilt, the regulations
specifically stated: "The saffron kilt, pleated all around." By the
Second World War, the Irish piper's costume had become
standardized, with saffron kilt, green caubeen and the brat, or
cloak. Besides the Royal Irish Regiment of the British Army, the
South African Irish Regiment and the Irish Regiment of Canada still
maintain pipers and the now traditional Irish uniform today.
IRISH TARTANS
As one can tell from reading the above, from its inception at
the end of the 19th century, the kilt in Ireland has been solid
color, generally saffron or green. In fact, the use of solid kilts
by Irish pipers has led many to the erroneous assumption that the
very concept of a solid kilt is Irish in origin. In actuality,
solid kilts have been worn in Scotland for centuries (the earliest
depiction of a solid kilt we know of being a portrait of Sir Duncan
Campbell of Lochow painted in 1635). Solid kilts in Scotland simply
have never been as popular or widely acclaimed as their tartan
cousins.
Nevertheless, until the fairly recent past, when one spoke of an
Irish kilt, it was understood to be solid color. More recently,
however, the concept of named tartans, worn in a representative
fashion, has made its way into Irish kilt wearing. Perform an
internet search today for "Irish tartans" and one will find
countless references to the Irish National tartan, tartans for all
the Irish counties, and many Irish family tartans. How did this
occur? While the concept of named tartans, worn to represent a
particular family or region, is new to Ireland, the use of tartan
cloth in a more general sense is not. Archaeological finds give us
evidence that tartan cloth was worn in Ireland centuries ago.
THE ULSTER TARTAN
One of the most famous and well-preserved examples is the
Dungiven outfit, found near Londonderry in 1956. The outfit
consisted of fragments of a cloak, a doublet, and trews made from
tartan fabric. The outfit was sent to the Ulster Museum where it
was dated c. 1600-1650. It was determined that the trews had likely
been tailored in Scotland, but the tartan fabric itself woven in
Ireland. (It is worth noting that the Ulster region in Ireland was
at this time being settled heavily by Scottish emigrants, so it is
at least conceivable that the cloth was woven by a Scottish weaver
relocated to Ireland). Textile expert Audrey Henshall was able to
reproduce the tartan pattern for a 1958 exhibit; and it is this
exhibit that could very well be responsible for the entire "Irish
tartan" phenomenon. For it is only after this time that we are able
to find anything about named Irish tartans at all. Called "the
Ulster tartan," the pattern was recreated for commercial purposes
and promoted with great enthusiasm.
A newspaper clipping in the collection of the Ulster Museum, dated
November 4, 1968 (from an unknown paper) mentions that a cloak in
the Ulster tartan was presented to the Duchess of Kent during a
London fashion show. Another clipping in the same collection, from
January 2, 1970, speaks of this tartan being used in ties, table
linens, and to "decorate model dollies." "The tartan tie and/or
the tartan waistcoat should become part of the standard equipment
of every member of the Northern Ireland Civil Service when leaving
Ulster on official business," the author writes. "It
should similarly decorate the torso of every Ulster politician,
especially those of cabinet rank."
And what of the kilt? "Every Ulsterman who is proud of his
kneecaps should wear an Ulster tartan kilt..." The author goes
on to encourage Ulster girls to own both mini and maxi skirts in
the "local cloth," and suggests using the tartan in the drapes and
furnishings of every Ulster-based office. He ends the article with
a tongue-in-cheek jab by suggesting the government encourage use of
the tartan by sponsoring an annual contest for ideas on how to use
it. First prize would be a week's stay in Ulster. Second prize
would be a two-week stay! Self-depreciating humor aside, the flurry
of promotion surrounding the Ulster tartan after its unveiling in
1958, as evidenced by the above quoted articles, corresponds with
the earliest known dates for many named Irish tartans.
A characteristic example is the Tara tartan which first makes its
appearance under the name "Tara" being sold to Irish customers in
The Kilt Shop in Edinburgh in 1967. Tartan researcher D. C. Stewart
notes that it was being sold under the name "Murphy" by the same
business to American tourists during the 1977 International
Gathering of the Clans. He comments, "It is known that a
company called Wexford Weavers were taking some Scottish tartans,
changing the colours and giving them Irish names." Indeed, the
Tara/Murphy tartan (which has also been sold under the name
"O'Keefe") is simply the traditional MacLean of Duart tartan
rendered in different colors.
Another tartan in the same vein is the Clodagh tartan. The account
of this tartan, as related in District Tartans by Dr. D Gordon
Teall and Dr. Phil Smith, speaks of a County Tyrone bagpipe maker
named Andrew Warnock who wrote to the Scottish Tartans Society in
1979. He claimed at the time that the tartan was called "Clodnaugh
Irish," and that it was an old tartan discovered in the Bog of
Allen in southern Ireland. This story has never been substantiated,
however (and it is worth considering that it may have been a
marketing ploy inspired by the discovery of the Ulster tartan). The
earliest proven date for this tartan is a sample in the collection
of the Scottish Tartans Society woven by D. C. Dalgliesh of Selkirk
in 1970. It is also worth noting that the Clodagh tartan is a
color-variation of the popular Royal Stewart design, which
corresponds to the practice noted by D. C. Stewart of weaving firms
inventing "Irish" tartans by changing the colors of preexisting
Scottish designs.
Following this same practice are the O'Farrell tartan, first
documented in 1978 by US tartan researcher William H. Johnston, and
the Shaughnessy tartan, designed by Scotch Corner in Gateshead in
2003. Both are Royal Stewart variants. Scotch Corner, in fact, has
been the designer of many recent "Irish family" tartans, and seems
to be carrying on the tradition of the Wexford Weavers by
repurposing traditional Scottish tartans. Further examples abound,
but there is no need to list them each in detail. The fact remains
that all of the known Irish family and regional tartans can be
dated to some point between the 1960s and today. One can only
assume that the enthusiasm surrounding the discovery and promotion
of the historic Ulster tartan was the genesis for this surge of
Irish tartans. One also must realize that the idea of named Irish
tartans, though perhaps originating in Ulster, has only enjoyed
meaningful success outside of Ireland itself. Note the comment of
D. C. Stewart, quoted above, remarking that the Murphy tartan was
being sold "to American tourists." And quite a few of these
so-called "Irish" tartans were actually produced and marketed by
Scottish interests.
Today, without a doubt, the most popular and widely recognized
Irish tartans are the Irish County tartans (together with the Irish
National) that are produced by the House of Edgar in Perth,
Scotland. These were designed in 1996 by Polly Wittering and have
since been a major success. More recently still, a new range of
tartans for each Irish County (along with a similarly named and
similarly colored "Ireland's National tartan") has been created by
Viking Technologies of Glasgow working with Marton Mills of
Yorkshire. Both of these lines of Irish county tartans are
extremely popular among those of the Irish Diaspora (mainly in the
United States) who wish to wear a kilt to honor their "Celtic
heritage."
It is worth noting here that none of the Irish county tartans
(from either producer), nor the so-called "national" tartans, have
any official standing at all with the Irish government. Nor do most
of the Irish family name tartans have any formal provenance with
the families. It would appear that many are simply designed on
spec, or as requested by a customer who happens to bear an Irish
surname and is looking for a "family tartan." There are
some Irish tartans that do have a stronger case
for recognition. A prime example would be the Cian tartan, which
was designed by Ralph and Patricia Saunders for the Clan Cian of
Ely and registered with the Chief Herald of Ireland in 1983. One
may well ask what the Chief Herald of Ireland has to do with
tartan, and that would be a very good question. Nevertheless, this
is an example of one Irish tartan that has gained some popularity
among the family and seems also to have the approval of a titled
head of the family. This fact makes the Cian tartan in the definite
minority, however, as far as named Irish tartans are concerned.
CLANS ORIGINAUX and PENDLETON MILL
Readers with some familiarity with Irish tartans may be asking,
"But what of the Clans Originaux?" This was long thought
to be a book, published in Paris in 1880, and held at Pendleton
Woolen Mill in Oregon, which detailed the setts of some early Irish
tartans. These included Fitzpatrick, Kiernan, Forde, and many
others including the aforementioned Murphy tartan. It was always
seen as somewhat of an enigma, suggesting the use of named Irish
tartans well before any other established date.
In 2003, Brian Wilton of the Scottish Tartans Authority was able
to make contact with Pendleton Woolen Mill and was sent photographs
detailing Clans Originaux. What he was able to learn from this
information was quite enlightening. First of all, this was not an
actual published book, but rather a collection of tartan samples -
what we would call today a "swatch book" - that would be used in a
shop to sell tartan cloth and clothing (in this case, a shop in
Paris). But the most amazing discovery was the complete lack of any
Irish tartans. Of the some 185 tartans included in the book, all
were well known and established Scottish tartans.
Where did the idea come from, then, that this 1880 collection
contained Irish tartans? Information on these tartans was passed on
to the Scottish Tartans Society by William H. Johnston after a
visit he made to Pendleton Mill in 1977. Apparently he recorded
details of many tartans with Irish names that were in Pendleton's
collection. He also made notes about Clans Originaux, and somehow
his information on Irish tartans was incorrectly attributed to that
source in the Scottish Tartans Society archives. It was not until
2003, when Clans Originaux could be formally documented, that the
mistake was discovered. Of course by then, the Clans Originaux
reference and the 1880 date had been repeated in so many sources
regarding Irish tartans that this "myth" will be with us for quite
some time.
William Johnston did record the details of some Irish named
tartans on his visit to Pendleton. But it would be erroneous to
assume that these tartans dated much earlier than his 1977 visit.
It is known that Pendleton was in the business of producing tartan
cloth both in traditional Scottish patterns as well as their own
trade designs. And we know that they gave some of their designs
Irish names, including MacCormick and MacDevitt, (both variations
of the traditional Black Watch tartan). Many of the notes taken by
the late William H. Johnston were donated to the Scottish Tartans
Museum in Franklin, NC, by his fellow tartan researcher Philip D.
Smith. They have yet to be studied exhaustively, but it has already
been discovered that he noted during his visit several tartans
named for Irish counties, which would indicate the House of Edgar
was not the first company to have that idea!
Again, it must be pointed out that these are tartans being woven
outside of Ireland (in this case, in Oregon), and being given Irish
names, quite apart of any influence of the Irish people. And this
would indeed seem to be a common thread as far as Irish tartans in
general are concerned. The majority seem to have originated as
trade designs, created by non-Irish producers of tartan cloth,
based mostly in Scotland, and marketed to those of Irish descent,
mostly in North America. The influence of native Irish people,
either as suppliers or consumers of Irish tartans, would appear to
be minimal.
CONCLUSIONS
An article from the web site of the Royal Irish Rangers mentions
a photo from 1913 of pipers from the 4th Battalion, Royal Irish
Fusiliers playing at the funeral of the Duke of Abercorn wearing
kilts and "purses" (sporrans). In that same article, the unknown
author says of the adoption of the kilt in the Irish regiments,
"Who so ever began to introduce a Hibernian dress seems to have
leaned heavily on Caledonian custom." This quote speaks
volumes as to the history of Irish kilts & tartans, and serves
as a fitting conclusion to this article.
Books
Bottigheimer, Karl S. Ireland and the Irish: a short history. New
York: Columbia University Press, 1982.
Dunleavy, Janet E and Gareth W. Douglas Hyde: A Maker of Modern
Ireland. University of California Press, 1991.
Dunlevy, Mairead. Dress in Ireland. Doughcloyne, Wilton, Cork :
Collins Press, 1999.
Harris, R.G. and H.R.G. Wilson. The Irish Regiments, 1883-1999.
Sarpedon Publishers, 2000.
Kelly, M.J. The Fenian Ideal and Irish Nationalism, 1882-1916.
Woodbridge, Suffolk: The Boydell Press, 2006.
McClintock, Henry F. Handbook on the Traditional Old Irish Dress.
Dundalk, Ireland: Dundalgan Press (W. Tempest) Ltd., 1958.
Murphy, David. Irish regiments in the World Wars. Osprey
Publishing, 2007.
O'Neill, Timothy P. Life & Tradition in Rural Ireland. London:
J.M. Dent & Sons, 1977.
Sisson, Elaine. Pearse's Patriots: St. Edna's and the Cult of
Boyhood. Crosses Green: Cork University Press, 2004.
Websites
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~bwickham/index.htm
www.reconstructinghistory.com
http://www.youghalpipeband.com/history.php
http://www.blackravenpipeband.net/History.html
http://www.slotpb.com/history.shtml
http://www.somebody.to/pp.htm
http://st.louis.irish.tripod.com/
http://www.military.ie/army/specialists/music/pipes.htm
http://royalirishrangers.co.uk/uniform.html
Articles
"Religion: Ghost Stories". Time Magazine, Monday, February 18,
1957.
"Sir Shane Leslie, 3rd Bt. (1885-1971)". Introduction: Leslie
Papers. Public Record Office of Northern Ireland, November
2007.
"May Wear His Kilts". New York Times, May 24, 1913.
"Lethargy in Parliament." New York Times, April 29, 1900