1 00:00:02,260 --> 00:00:07,500 CHANTING AND SINGING 2 00:00:15,620 --> 00:00:18,940 This is Hunting Stewart of Appin, 3 00:00:18,940 --> 00:00:23,340 which was right in the middle of the main charge at Culloden. 4 00:00:24,700 --> 00:00:26,380 They said, "charge", 5 00:00:26,380 --> 00:00:29,220 and unfortunately they all got slaughtered. 6 00:00:29,220 --> 00:00:31,260 They got stuck in the mud. 7 00:00:31,260 --> 00:00:34,340 MUSIC 8 00:00:34,340 --> 00:00:38,380 This is the story of a fabric that tells stories. 9 00:00:38,380 --> 00:00:41,540 MUSIC 10 00:00:41,540 --> 00:00:43,980 Unlike any other material in the world, 11 00:00:43,980 --> 00:00:46,100 tartan tells tales, 12 00:00:48,540 --> 00:00:51,620 tales you can't entirely trust. 13 00:00:51,620 --> 00:00:54,260 The Sobieski Stuarts claimed they had the book 14 00:00:54,260 --> 00:00:58,700 that showed exactly what each clan wore. 15 00:00:58,700 --> 00:01:00,060 The fact it was made up, 16 00:01:00,060 --> 00:01:02,620 the fact it was made up by two lads from Surrey 17 00:01:02,620 --> 00:01:06,100 is just one of these wonderful paradoxes of Scottish culture. 18 00:01:06,100 --> 00:01:07,940 CANNON BLASTS 19 00:01:09,660 --> 00:01:12,380 The story of tartan is a story of Highland clans, 20 00:01:12,380 --> 00:01:16,380 ousted monarchs, military valour, queens with their tartan fetish, 21 00:01:16,380 --> 00:01:21,060 musical performers and outright frauds. 22 00:01:21,060 --> 00:01:24,980 Tartan is so woven into the Scottish national story 23 00:01:24,980 --> 00:01:30,300 that it's quite difficult to distinguish fact from semi fact 24 00:01:30,300 --> 00:01:31,380 from outright fiction. 25 00:01:31,380 --> 00:01:33,860 And in some ways, that's the glorious thing about tartan 26 00:01:33,860 --> 00:01:35,460 because it doesn't really matter! 27 00:01:36,780 --> 00:01:39,740 All countries seek to elaborate a national history 28 00:01:39,740 --> 00:01:42,980 that has one foot in fiction and one foot in fact. 29 00:01:42,980 --> 00:01:45,900 MUSIC 30 00:01:59,260 --> 00:02:03,580 In a side gallery of Edinburgh's National Museum of Scotland, 31 00:02:03,580 --> 00:02:07,620 hidden away, vanishingly small - blink and you'll miss it - 32 00:02:07,620 --> 00:02:10,020 is the earliest surviving physical evidence 33 00:02:10,020 --> 00:02:13,300 that Scots have always been in love with chequered things. 34 00:02:21,180 --> 00:02:23,100 Found in 1934, 35 00:02:23,100 --> 00:02:26,260 popularly known as, 'the Falkirk Tartan', 36 00:02:27,700 --> 00:02:32,100 this piece of fabric has been firmly dated to the late third century AD. 37 00:02:33,740 --> 00:02:35,380 But look closer. 38 00:02:35,380 --> 00:02:36,860 The label says, 39 00:02:36,860 --> 00:02:40,100 " Woollen cloth fragment with check pattern," 40 00:02:40,100 --> 00:02:42,900 and the reconstruction has a herringbone. 41 00:02:42,900 --> 00:02:45,060 It looks decidedly tweedy. 42 00:02:46,740 --> 00:02:50,460 What we think of as tartan is really very simple indeed. 43 00:02:50,460 --> 00:02:52,860 It's an ordinary woven cloth. 44 00:02:52,860 --> 00:02:57,420 Threads of different coloured wool combined in a pattern that repeats, 45 00:02:57,420 --> 00:02:59,460 known as a "sett" or "thread count", 46 00:02:59,460 --> 00:03:01,980 producing squares and lines of different sizes 47 00:03:01,980 --> 00:03:03,660 and contrasting colours. 48 00:03:03,660 --> 00:03:06,220 The possibilities are literally infinite. 49 00:03:07,580 --> 00:03:09,220 This is Elliot tartan. 50 00:03:10,300 --> 00:03:12,220 This is Lamont tartan. 51 00:03:13,900 --> 00:03:18,300 If you look back in history, tartan is very definitely a Celtic art form. 52 00:03:18,300 --> 00:03:23,100 Very many descriptions, in Roman times, of tartan. 53 00:03:23,100 --> 00:03:24,780 They didn't use the word 'tartan', 54 00:03:24,780 --> 00:03:27,340 but they would explain it in different ways, 55 00:03:27,340 --> 00:03:30,020 'speckled', 'variegated', 'this way and that'. 56 00:03:31,260 --> 00:03:35,620 The difference in those times and until relatively recently, 57 00:03:35,620 --> 00:03:38,700 is that tartan didn't actually mean anything. 58 00:03:38,700 --> 00:03:40,980 Tartan, many, many years ago, 59 00:03:40,980 --> 00:03:43,420 would have been a tartan which was more to do 60 00:03:43,420 --> 00:03:45,220 with the district or the region 61 00:03:45,220 --> 00:03:46,580 that the family perhaps lived. 62 00:03:46,580 --> 00:03:47,740 And that's because 63 00:03:47,740 --> 00:03:51,140 they were only able to get colours from local plants, 64 00:03:51,140 --> 00:03:54,180 And they'd be woven by a local tradesperson, a weaver, 65 00:03:54,180 --> 00:03:55,860 on an old loom of some description. 66 00:03:55,860 --> 00:03:59,140 So, they would just be colours that were really to do with the region, 67 00:03:59,140 --> 00:04:01,060 and you'd probably find that lots of families 68 00:04:01,060 --> 00:04:02,940 might have worn similar colours. 69 00:04:02,940 --> 00:04:06,300 MUSIC 70 00:04:09,180 --> 00:04:11,740 Ancient tartans had nothing to do with clans. 71 00:04:12,700 --> 00:04:15,780 They were loosely associated with Highland regions 72 00:04:15,780 --> 00:04:18,260 and a Highland lifestyle that Lowlanders - 73 00:04:18,260 --> 00:04:19,940 whose choice of fabric was limited 74 00:04:19,940 --> 00:04:22,860 to the simple shepherd check or Lowland drabs - 75 00:04:22,860 --> 00:04:24,660 tended to be rude about. 76 00:04:24,660 --> 00:04:26,860 MUSIC 77 00:04:28,500 --> 00:04:31,140 Highlanders were seen as primitive, lawless, 78 00:04:31,140 --> 00:04:33,580 Gaelic-speaking cattle rustlers. 79 00:04:33,580 --> 00:04:37,460 They wore their tartans as a single piece of cloth - the braecanfaile, 80 00:04:37,460 --> 00:04:41,100 or great kilt - belted at the waist, and pinned over the shoulder. 81 00:04:44,020 --> 00:04:46,380 When tartan finally acquired the power of speech, 82 00:04:46,380 --> 00:04:49,060 the language it spoke was politics. 83 00:04:50,820 --> 00:04:53,660 It expressed your support for a Scottish line of kings - 84 00:04:53,660 --> 00:04:55,540 the Stuarts. 85 00:04:55,540 --> 00:04:58,180 The Stuarts had held the English throne as well 86 00:04:58,180 --> 00:05:01,860 since Elizabeth I died childless in 1603. 87 00:05:01,860 --> 00:05:06,540 But in 1688, the last Stuart king - James II - was deposed 88 00:05:06,540 --> 00:05:09,740 because he was a Catholic, in the Glorious Revolution. 89 00:05:12,340 --> 00:05:15,620 In 1707, the Act of Union turned England and Scotland 90 00:05:15,620 --> 00:05:17,420 into a single kingdom 91 00:05:17,420 --> 00:05:21,060 and one of the first protests was in woven form. 92 00:05:24,220 --> 00:05:27,300 We see it with the creation of the Jacobite set of tartan 93 00:05:27,300 --> 00:05:29,900 in Edinburgh, shortly after 1707. 94 00:05:29,900 --> 00:05:31,100 It's fairly bright. 95 00:05:31,100 --> 00:05:34,140 So it has white, which is the white rose - 96 00:05:34,140 --> 00:05:36,660 the badge of the House of Stuart. 97 00:05:36,660 --> 00:05:40,580 It has red, which is also the battle standard of the Jacobites, 98 00:05:40,580 --> 00:05:42,900 for example in 1745. 99 00:05:42,900 --> 00:05:44,620 So, strongly linked with the Stuarts, 100 00:05:44,620 --> 00:05:46,380 strongly linked with Stuart patriotism. 101 00:05:46,380 --> 00:05:47,980 You can buy them again today. 102 00:05:49,340 --> 00:05:53,820 SINGING 103 00:05:53,820 --> 00:05:55,540 Tartan expressed your belief 104 00:05:55,540 --> 00:05:58,900 that the Stuarts should still be running both countries. 105 00:05:58,900 --> 00:06:00,740 Englishmen wore it too. 106 00:06:05,620 --> 00:06:09,140 In 1744, as another Jacobite rebellion approached, 107 00:06:09,140 --> 00:06:12,980 English MP Sir John Hynde-Cotton visited Edinburgh 108 00:06:12,980 --> 00:06:16,340 and treated himself to a suit of Highland clothes. 109 00:06:20,660 --> 00:06:23,700 This was a political statement on the grandest scale. 110 00:06:23,700 --> 00:06:25,300 Sir John was a salad dodger, 111 00:06:26,380 --> 00:06:30,180 who stood six feet four in his vibrant trews. 112 00:06:33,260 --> 00:06:35,860 Well, this is the only surviving Highland suit of this period, 113 00:06:35,860 --> 00:06:37,180 so it's extremely rare. 114 00:06:37,180 --> 00:06:39,940 And it does have very interesting things to tell us about tartan. 115 00:06:39,940 --> 00:06:43,860 The jacket and the trews are made of the same tartan, 116 00:06:43,860 --> 00:06:45,580 in terms of the legs of the trews, 117 00:06:45,580 --> 00:06:48,380 but the trews also have two other tartans that they're made from. 118 00:06:48,380 --> 00:06:50,860 And the plaid, again, is a different tartan. 119 00:06:50,860 --> 00:06:55,620 So it shows us that the idea of being dressed head to toe in a clan tartan 120 00:06:55,620 --> 00:06:57,580 did not exist at this period, 121 00:06:57,580 --> 00:07:01,900 that it's very much choosing a tartan according to your individual taste. 122 00:07:01,900 --> 00:07:04,100 MILITARY DRUM BEAT 123 00:07:06,740 --> 00:07:09,260 Jacobite supporters wore tartan. 124 00:07:09,260 --> 00:07:11,500 Their candidate for the throne did not. 125 00:07:11,500 --> 00:07:13,540 Charles Edward Stuart was painted 126 00:07:13,540 --> 00:07:16,900 as a permanently bonnie candidate for the British throne, 127 00:07:16,900 --> 00:07:19,060 with no trace of tartan at all. 128 00:07:20,220 --> 00:07:23,660 That kind of image of youth was kept right through 129 00:07:23,660 --> 00:07:27,820 because it was an image of potential. 130 00:07:27,820 --> 00:07:30,860 Effectively, youth is what restoration is about, 131 00:07:30,860 --> 00:07:32,900 and restoration is what youth is about. 132 00:07:32,900 --> 00:07:35,900 So this image, was perpetuated right the way through 133 00:07:35,900 --> 00:07:37,860 for the next 20 years. 134 00:07:37,860 --> 00:07:40,700 He didn't really age in many of his pictures, 135 00:07:40,700 --> 00:07:44,540 particularly the ones that were painted for propaganda purposes. 136 00:07:44,540 --> 00:07:49,220 MILITARY DRUMBEATS 137 00:07:49,220 --> 00:07:53,700 Said propaganda required a reboot for Charlie's graphic identity. 138 00:07:55,500 --> 00:07:56,580 He stayed young. 139 00:07:57,740 --> 00:08:00,260 His clothes went north. 140 00:08:00,260 --> 00:08:04,660 # We are hundred pipers an' all, an' all 141 00:08:04,660 --> 00:08:06,660 # We'll up an' gie them a blaw, a blaw 142 00:08:06,660 --> 00:08:09,460 # We are hundred pipers and all and all... # 143 00:08:09,460 --> 00:08:11,780 On the 16th of April, 1746, 144 00:08:11,780 --> 00:08:15,980 the real Bonnie Prince Charlie - a man in his mid twenties - 145 00:08:15,980 --> 00:08:17,700 stood with 7,000 Jacobites, 146 00:08:17,700 --> 00:08:22,620 facing 8,000 government troops on Culloden Moor. 147 00:08:22,620 --> 00:08:24,940 # O! Our sodger lads looked braw, looked braw 148 00:08:24,940 --> 00:08:26,980 # Wi' their tartan kilts an' a' an' a' 149 00:08:26,980 --> 00:08:29,620 # Wi' their bonnets feathers an' glitt'rin' gear 150 00:08:29,620 --> 00:08:31,940 # An pibrochs sounding loud and clear. # 151 00:08:33,780 --> 00:08:36,540 At the battlefield museum, the film recreating the battle 152 00:08:36,540 --> 00:08:39,580 is shown in something close to black and white. 153 00:08:39,580 --> 00:08:42,420 The reality will have been too colourful to bear. 154 00:08:44,820 --> 00:08:46,820 Both sides wore tartan. 155 00:08:46,820 --> 00:08:49,540 On Charlie's side, the tartans clashed. 156 00:08:49,540 --> 00:08:52,060 Doublets were unrelated to the plaid. 157 00:08:52,060 --> 00:08:54,620 Hose bore no relation to either. 158 00:08:56,500 --> 00:08:59,500 Highlanders fought on the government side as well. 159 00:08:59,500 --> 00:09:02,420 These Highland regiments wore tartan too - 160 00:09:02,420 --> 00:09:05,700 in a sett that had been designed in 1739 - 161 00:09:07,380 --> 00:09:09,340 the Black Watch tartan. 162 00:09:09,340 --> 00:09:11,300 A tartan loyal to the Union, 163 00:09:11,300 --> 00:09:14,260 a restrained tartan in darker blues and greens. 164 00:09:14,260 --> 00:09:15,820 EXPLOSION 165 00:09:15,820 --> 00:09:21,660 Original Black Watch tartan, it's a regiment of the Scottish army. 166 00:09:21,660 --> 00:09:26,620 It's very respected in the services. 167 00:09:26,620 --> 00:09:27,740 It's well known. 168 00:09:27,740 --> 00:09:29,380 It's a nice tartan. 169 00:09:29,380 --> 00:09:32,420 It's not as colourful as some of the other ones, 170 00:09:32,420 --> 00:09:37,060 but it's known throughout the world. Scotland's a fantastic place. 171 00:09:39,540 --> 00:09:40,940 I was, years ago. 172 00:09:44,340 --> 00:09:47,460 The Black Watch Scots Guards. 173 00:09:47,460 --> 00:09:49,620 It's now the Scots Guards, it's called. 174 00:09:49,620 --> 00:09:52,060 They're all joined together now, 175 00:09:52,060 --> 00:09:54,180 the government's changed them. 176 00:09:54,180 --> 00:09:57,340 CHANTING: Scotland! Scotland! Scotland! 177 00:09:57,340 --> 00:09:59,740 Scotland! Scotland! Scotland! 178 00:10:07,460 --> 00:10:11,260 The Jacobites were defeated in little more than an hour. 179 00:10:11,260 --> 00:10:14,020 Bonnie Prince Charlie's tartan regalia 180 00:10:14,020 --> 00:10:16,060 became the stuff of souvenirs. 181 00:10:16,060 --> 00:10:17,740 There was no longer any hope 182 00:10:17,740 --> 00:10:20,460 of restoring an independent kingdom of Scotland - 183 00:10:20,460 --> 00:10:23,540 and as the most visible sign of Jacobite allegiance, 184 00:10:23,540 --> 00:10:25,660 tartan was banned. 185 00:10:34,340 --> 00:10:36,020 It was seen as such an icon 186 00:10:36,020 --> 00:10:38,460 to the Scottish population at the time 187 00:10:38,460 --> 00:10:42,220 that by banning it, it took away part of their souls. 188 00:10:42,220 --> 00:10:45,460 It was part of their unity, part of their identity 189 00:10:45,460 --> 00:10:48,060 so to ban it was pretty serious. 190 00:10:48,060 --> 00:10:51,060 It was a major part of their lives, just disappeared. 191 00:10:53,660 --> 00:10:56,500 # Come and dance Let's all be merry 192 00:10:56,500 --> 00:10:59,580 # Come and learn Let's all be merry... # 193 00:10:59,580 --> 00:11:01,940 All the opportunities were elsewhere. 194 00:11:01,940 --> 00:11:06,660 London slowly filled with expatriate Scottish aristocrats 195 00:11:06,660 --> 00:11:08,100 who now needed a history 196 00:11:08,100 --> 00:11:10,820 that had nothing to do with Jacobite rebellion. 197 00:11:12,380 --> 00:11:18,060 Take one: In 1778 they formed the Highland Society of London. 198 00:11:19,460 --> 00:11:22,100 A fan club for the recently discovered writings of Ossian - 199 00:11:22,100 --> 00:11:24,500 an ancient Scottish bard. 200 00:11:24,500 --> 00:11:26,300 These texts - 201 00:11:26,300 --> 00:11:29,780 proof that Scotland had an ancient, epic history - 202 00:11:29,780 --> 00:11:32,460 had, it seemed, been discovered and translated 203 00:11:32,460 --> 00:11:35,540 by one James MacPherson. 204 00:11:35,540 --> 00:11:37,500 Only they hadn't! 205 00:11:37,500 --> 00:11:41,220 MacPherson had largely made them up from genuine Irish epics. 206 00:11:41,220 --> 00:11:43,620 Clearly, for people reading it in its first edition, 207 00:11:43,620 --> 00:11:45,140 they thought they were reading, 208 00:11:45,140 --> 00:11:46,540 for the first time, 209 00:11:46,540 --> 00:11:51,540 the publication of this fantastic, er, Gaelic epic, 210 00:11:51,540 --> 00:11:55,060 which describes the early history of Scotland 211 00:11:55,060 --> 00:11:58,460 and it put Scotland on the map in the way that other countries 212 00:11:58,460 --> 00:12:02,100 which had their great verse epics of the early romantic period, 213 00:12:02,100 --> 00:12:04,820 and why shouldn't Scotland have one of its own? 214 00:12:04,820 --> 00:12:08,060 So, he supplied it? Yes, absolutely. 215 00:12:08,060 --> 00:12:09,620 The curious thing about Scotland 216 00:12:09,620 --> 00:12:12,260 is that it's creating a useable national past, 217 00:12:12,260 --> 00:12:16,340 a national past at the point where it ceased to be a nation state. 218 00:12:16,340 --> 00:12:18,380 So, that's what's remarkable about this. 219 00:12:18,380 --> 00:12:21,020 There's this kind of nation building thing going on, almost, 220 00:12:21,020 --> 00:12:23,580 almost the creation of a Scottish nationhood at the point 221 00:12:23,580 --> 00:12:26,180 decades after the state has ceased to exist. 222 00:12:26,180 --> 00:12:29,780 That's unique. But the actual process isn't unique. 223 00:12:29,780 --> 00:12:32,140 And its quite wrong, I think, to think of Scotland 224 00:12:32,140 --> 00:12:35,140 as being... having a particularly invented past or history. 225 00:12:35,140 --> 00:12:37,060 Most nations do this. 226 00:12:40,740 --> 00:12:45,340 With Ossian exposed, the Highland Society tried take two - 227 00:12:45,340 --> 00:12:46,780 tartan. 228 00:12:46,780 --> 00:12:49,300 They called for an end to the tartan ban. 229 00:12:49,300 --> 00:12:52,580 Tartan had never really been political, they said, 230 00:12:52,580 --> 00:12:54,300 it was all about clans. 231 00:12:55,660 --> 00:12:57,860 This cosy notion wasn't entirely new. 232 00:12:57,860 --> 00:13:01,420 Some MacDonalds had taken to wearing a particular tartan 233 00:13:01,420 --> 00:13:03,620 during Jacobite times. 234 00:13:03,620 --> 00:13:05,860 The ban was revoked. 235 00:13:05,860 --> 00:13:07,300 And one or two other clans 236 00:13:07,300 --> 00:13:10,820 began forming links with particular tartans. 237 00:13:10,820 --> 00:13:11,860 The MacGregors. 238 00:13:12,900 --> 00:13:14,780 The Gordons. 239 00:13:14,780 --> 00:13:19,780 That's a Scotland tartan. That's a real Gordon tartan. 240 00:13:19,780 --> 00:13:21,340 Pride! 241 00:13:21,340 --> 00:13:24,860 I'm wearing a kilt, and a MacGregor kilt, yeah. 242 00:13:24,860 --> 00:13:27,100 # Now the fiddler's ready Let us all begin 243 00:13:27,100 --> 00:13:29,500 # So step it out and step it in 244 00:13:29,500 --> 00:13:31,900 # To the merry music of the violin 245 00:13:31,900 --> 00:13:34,820 # We'll dance the hours away... # 246 00:13:34,820 --> 00:13:38,300 For 30 or 40 years, William Wilson's of Bannockburn - 247 00:13:38,300 --> 00:13:40,140 the leading weavers of tartan - 248 00:13:40,140 --> 00:13:41,980 had done very nicely thank you 249 00:13:41,980 --> 00:13:45,420 out of government tartan orders for the Highland regiments. 250 00:13:45,420 --> 00:13:48,140 # So step it out and step it in 251 00:13:48,140 --> 00:13:49,540 # To the merry music... # 252 00:13:49,540 --> 00:13:52,860 By the 1790s, two or three families were forming a habit, 253 00:13:52,860 --> 00:13:55,620 as far as particular tartans were concerned. 254 00:13:55,620 --> 00:13:59,860 But for everyone else, tartan was simply nice to look at. 255 00:13:59,860 --> 00:14:02,220 # We'll dance the hours away... # 256 00:14:02,220 --> 00:14:06,060 These were being ordered to be sent to the Duke of Beaufort in London 257 00:14:06,060 --> 00:14:08,860 which instantly takes you into fashionable London society 258 00:14:08,860 --> 00:14:10,740 and gives a real context to it. 259 00:14:10,740 --> 00:14:13,540 This one's being ordered from Fort William. 260 00:14:13,540 --> 00:14:18,100 This swatch has been sent. They're asking to change some of the colours. 261 00:14:18,100 --> 00:14:20,660 It shows the sort of dialogue between the client and Wilson's, 262 00:14:20,660 --> 00:14:22,340 in terms of designing the tartans, 263 00:14:22,340 --> 00:14:25,540 that things were being constantly, not just invented, 264 00:14:25,540 --> 00:14:28,180 but it was part of a design process, basically, 265 00:14:28,180 --> 00:14:32,900 giving the client what they want, but also contributing Wilson's expertise 266 00:14:32,900 --> 00:14:34,580 in terms of colour and pattern. 267 00:14:34,580 --> 00:14:37,460 # Cope sent a challenge frae Dunbar 268 00:14:37,460 --> 00:14:40,060 # 'Charlie, meet me an' ye daur, 269 00:14:40,060 --> 00:14:42,300 # An' I'll learn you the art o' war 270 00:14:42,300 --> 00:14:44,020 # If you'll meet me i' the morning... # 271 00:14:44,020 --> 00:14:47,660 What Wilson's customers wanted wasn't tradition. 272 00:14:47,660 --> 00:14:50,780 They wanted novelty and vibrant colour. 273 00:14:50,780 --> 00:14:53,620 Imported dyes, indigo blue, 274 00:14:53,620 --> 00:14:57,540 red cochineal from squashed Mexican beetles. 275 00:14:57,540 --> 00:15:00,060 This colour here's very close to the colour 276 00:15:00,060 --> 00:15:03,820 that was being produced back in the mid 18th century 277 00:15:03,820 --> 00:15:06,620 on the tartans that was analysed at the museum. 278 00:15:08,180 --> 00:15:11,740 We were able to look at records from the Wilson of Bannockburn 279 00:15:11,740 --> 00:15:14,140 and in them we found some remarkable evidence, 280 00:15:14,140 --> 00:15:15,260 where it was saying 281 00:15:15,260 --> 00:15:17,500 the price they were paying for the cochineal, 282 00:15:17,500 --> 00:15:19,460 how they wanted it at any expense, 283 00:15:19,460 --> 00:15:22,540 they wanted it for its bright red scarlet colour. 284 00:15:22,540 --> 00:15:25,300 Being able to take that evidence we're finding materially, 285 00:15:25,300 --> 00:15:27,580 matching it up with this historical documentation 286 00:15:27,580 --> 00:15:29,580 that we have from some of the makers, 287 00:15:29,580 --> 00:15:33,340 we get this better view of tartan as being 288 00:15:33,340 --> 00:15:38,460 a much better quality, fashionable, very brightly coloured, textile. 289 00:15:43,540 --> 00:15:48,700 # White waves on the water 290 00:15:48,700 --> 00:15:54,380 # Gold leaves on the tree... # 291 00:15:54,380 --> 00:15:57,140 Tartan was fashionable. 292 00:15:57,140 --> 00:15:59,980 By definition, it was for the rich. 293 00:15:59,980 --> 00:16:02,420 But people weren't sure how to wear it. 294 00:16:02,420 --> 00:16:06,420 A tartan Gok Wan was required. 295 00:16:06,420 --> 00:16:10,300 People like Alastair Ranaldson MacDonnell of Glengarry 296 00:16:10,300 --> 00:16:11,820 began to make up the rules 297 00:16:11,820 --> 00:16:13,980 according to which it should be worn. 298 00:16:13,980 --> 00:16:18,700 The most essential accessory of all was impeccable breeding. 299 00:16:18,700 --> 00:16:23,180 The Gaels, Glengarry declared, were a romantic race. 300 00:16:23,180 --> 00:16:28,300 But not romantic enough to be worth keeping on his Highland estates. 301 00:16:28,300 --> 00:16:33,540 Glengarry reduced his tenantry from 1,500 people to 35 302 00:16:33,540 --> 00:16:35,980 and replaced them with sheep, 303 00:16:35,980 --> 00:16:41,100 whose contribution to Glengarry's favourite fabric was anonymous 304 00:16:41,100 --> 00:16:42,740 but fundamental. 305 00:16:44,180 --> 00:16:46,460 In 1815, Glengarry formed 306 00:16:46,460 --> 00:16:50,380 the Society of True Highlanders in Edinburgh. 307 00:16:50,380 --> 00:16:52,860 He had competition - the Celtic Society, 308 00:16:52,860 --> 00:16:56,220 who Glengarry saw as a bunch of self-deluding Lowlanders 309 00:16:56,220 --> 00:16:58,460 with no right to wear tartan at all. 310 00:16:58,460 --> 00:17:01,500 # She came at your crying... # 311 00:17:01,500 --> 00:17:05,060 Sir Walter Scott - a founding member of the Celtic Society - 312 00:17:05,060 --> 00:17:07,300 was indeed a Lowlander 313 00:17:07,300 --> 00:17:11,460 and the author of historical novels such as Waverley and Rob Roy. 314 00:17:11,460 --> 00:17:12,940 # Sighing 315 00:17:12,940 --> 00:17:16,340 # Made music... # 316 00:17:16,340 --> 00:17:19,380 His fictional heroes flirted with the tartan-clad romance 317 00:17:19,380 --> 00:17:22,020 of Scotland's Jacobite past. 318 00:17:22,020 --> 00:17:25,060 But ultimately, Scott was a tourist 319 00:17:25,060 --> 00:17:28,980 who always returned to a sensible Unionist present. 320 00:17:28,980 --> 00:17:32,500 Scott is a man whose deeply embedded in the Scottish ruling class - 321 00:17:32,500 --> 00:17:34,620 he knows most of the people in it - 322 00:17:34,620 --> 00:17:36,620 He was majorly in support of the Union. 323 00:17:36,620 --> 00:17:38,460 What he did want to do within the Union 324 00:17:38,460 --> 00:17:40,820 was maintain the notion of Scottish separateness, 325 00:17:40,820 --> 00:17:42,580 of a Scottish cultural identity. 326 00:17:42,580 --> 00:17:45,060 He had a very strong Scottish national consciousness, 327 00:17:45,060 --> 00:17:47,540 but that didn't mean that he was opposed to the Union. 328 00:17:47,540 --> 00:17:50,620 He saw that as absolutely essential and there was no alternative to it. 329 00:17:50,620 --> 00:17:55,460 # She came at your keening... # 330 00:17:55,460 --> 00:17:57,180 In the summer of 1822, 331 00:17:57,180 --> 00:17:59,340 the citizens of Edinburgh received word 332 00:17:59,340 --> 00:18:02,420 that they were about to be visited by King George IV. 333 00:18:02,420 --> 00:18:04,740 # And your sleep had new dreaming... # 334 00:18:04,740 --> 00:18:08,660 As kings go, George was unusually ludicrous. 335 00:18:08,660 --> 00:18:11,660 # And splendour and bloom... # 336 00:18:11,660 --> 00:18:13,580 But he was the only king they had, 337 00:18:13,580 --> 00:18:18,500 and Scotland hadn't seen a ruling monarch for 172 years. 338 00:18:18,500 --> 00:18:21,580 A special welcome was required, 339 00:18:21,580 --> 00:18:26,340 and Edinburgh's great and good knew that only one man could run the show. 340 00:18:26,340 --> 00:18:28,860 He was a consummate showman, Scott, 341 00:18:28,860 --> 00:18:31,980 but he was also a marvellous PR man. 342 00:18:31,980 --> 00:18:34,180 He knew what his audience wanted, 343 00:18:34,180 --> 00:18:37,060 and clearly they wanted romantic history. 344 00:18:37,060 --> 00:18:39,300 They wanted it wrapped in tartan, 345 00:18:39,300 --> 00:18:41,260 and they wanted it, somehow, 346 00:18:41,260 --> 00:18:46,380 in a non-threatening way to establish their Scottishness. 347 00:18:46,380 --> 00:18:50,220 And, yet again, what Scott was doing was taking fact 348 00:18:50,220 --> 00:18:53,420 and wrapping it in, you know, in spin. 349 00:18:53,420 --> 00:18:58,940 I suppose, if you put a modern, erm, spin on it - 350 00:18:58,940 --> 00:19:01,900 he was a wonderful 19th century spin doctor. 351 00:19:05,220 --> 00:19:07,820 Spin was certainly required. 352 00:19:07,820 --> 00:19:11,060 From a present in which the king was a comedy figure, 353 00:19:11,060 --> 00:19:14,460 in which working class protesters increasingly demanded the vote, 354 00:19:14,460 --> 00:19:19,020 Scott wanted to weave a new Britain out of materials from its past. 355 00:19:19,020 --> 00:19:22,860 He saw that tartan was the answer. 356 00:19:22,860 --> 00:19:26,340 After all, it showed that Scots were good at loyalty. 357 00:19:26,340 --> 00:19:29,020 Loyalty was the national dress. 358 00:19:29,020 --> 00:19:31,100 # Wi' a hundred pipers, an' a', an' a' 359 00:19:31,100 --> 00:19:33,100 # Wi' a hundred pipers, an' a', an' a', 360 00:19:33,100 --> 00:19:35,060 # We'll up an' gie them a blaw, a blaw 361 00:19:35,060 --> 00:19:38,020 # Wi' a hundred pipers, an' a', an' a'... # 362 00:19:38,020 --> 00:19:41,700 Thanks to Sir Walter Scott, George IV's visit to Edinburgh 363 00:19:41,700 --> 00:19:44,660 turned into a sort of tartan farce. 364 00:19:44,660 --> 00:19:46,860 MUSIC: The Hundred Pipers 365 00:19:46,860 --> 00:19:50,780 Scottish aristocrats attended, with retinues of servants, 366 00:19:50,780 --> 00:19:53,260 all wearing tartans which - in most cases - 367 00:19:53,260 --> 00:19:58,460 had been official clan tartans for about 48 hours. 368 00:19:58,460 --> 00:20:00,780 The king wore tartan too - 369 00:20:00,780 --> 00:20:03,940 a suit of Royal Stewart, specially made. 370 00:20:03,940 --> 00:20:06,340 But he didn't look this good. 371 00:20:06,340 --> 00:20:09,700 The artist had to leave out about five stone of king 372 00:20:09,700 --> 00:20:11,180 to achieve this image. 373 00:20:11,180 --> 00:20:14,020 DRUMBEATS 374 00:20:14,020 --> 00:20:16,340 But wrapped, as he was, in the fabric of those 375 00:20:16,340 --> 00:20:18,940 who had once been his dynasty's greatest enemies, 376 00:20:18,940 --> 00:20:23,620 George IV had indeed somehow become both a Jacobite monarch 377 00:20:23,620 --> 00:20:26,820 and the ruler of a unified England and Scotland. 378 00:20:26,820 --> 00:20:31,780 DRUMBEATS AND BAGPIPES 379 00:20:31,780 --> 00:20:34,780 I mean, yes, a lot of people viewed it as completely ridiculous, 380 00:20:34,780 --> 00:20:37,860 but like a lot of things that people view as completely ridiculous, 381 00:20:37,860 --> 00:20:40,700 the propaganda stuck. 382 00:20:40,700 --> 00:20:43,980 I think if he'd thought about it with his, you might say, 383 00:20:43,980 --> 00:20:46,220 serious historical head on, he might have realised 384 00:20:46,220 --> 00:20:48,580 what an appalling thing he had done. 385 00:20:48,580 --> 00:20:50,940 In a sense, Scott was a man of two minds, you know, 386 00:20:50,940 --> 00:20:53,100 there's the historical novelist who, actually, 387 00:20:53,100 --> 00:20:55,700 was quite a serious attempt to interpret Scottish history 388 00:20:55,700 --> 00:20:57,140 and then there's this fantasy, 389 00:20:57,140 --> 00:20:59,100 and the two things cannot be reconciled. 390 00:20:59,100 --> 00:21:01,340 They are quite separate bits of his head. 391 00:21:03,660 --> 00:21:07,940 MUSIC 392 00:21:11,900 --> 00:21:16,140 Almost certainly, Sir Walter Scott expected the effects of 1822 393 00:21:16,140 --> 00:21:19,460 to last no longer than the royal visit itself. 394 00:21:19,460 --> 00:21:21,980 But they lasted rather longer. 395 00:21:23,700 --> 00:21:25,420 All Scott had really done 396 00:21:25,420 --> 00:21:28,580 was lift the lid on 50 years of cultural change. 397 00:21:28,580 --> 00:21:32,740 But now several more clans had particular tartans 398 00:21:32,740 --> 00:21:35,700 and tartan stood for all of Scotland, 399 00:21:35,700 --> 00:21:39,540 even though Lowland Scots had no real connection with tartan at all. 400 00:21:39,540 --> 00:21:42,460 MUSIC 401 00:21:46,300 --> 00:21:49,740 Scott himself was woven in as well. 402 00:21:49,740 --> 00:21:51,180 On Edinburgh's Princes Street, 403 00:21:51,180 --> 00:21:55,260 at the foot of the largest monument to a writer on the entire planet, 404 00:21:55,260 --> 00:21:57,260 there he sits, 405 00:21:57,260 --> 00:21:59,700 wrapped in plaid. 406 00:21:59,700 --> 00:22:01,540 He looks slightly depressed. 407 00:22:04,620 --> 00:22:08,380 In 1829, Walter Scott heard news of two brothers 408 00:22:08,380 --> 00:22:11,540 who claimed to have an original manuscript, 409 00:22:11,540 --> 00:22:15,980 called the Vestiarium Scoticum or Wardrobe of the Scots. 410 00:22:15,980 --> 00:22:18,740 This manuscript, they claimed, 411 00:22:18,740 --> 00:22:22,980 listed 75 tartans traditionally connected with certain clans 412 00:22:22,980 --> 00:22:26,540 and could be traced all the way back to the 1580s, 413 00:22:28,660 --> 00:22:30,780 which would mean that the association 414 00:22:30,780 --> 00:22:34,460 between clans and tartans was at least hundreds of years old, 415 00:22:35,660 --> 00:22:37,460 instead of about 50. 416 00:22:47,100 --> 00:22:49,700 When Scott sees the Vestiarium Scoticum, 417 00:22:49,700 --> 00:22:53,340 he's well aware that this cannot be a 15th century manuscript. 418 00:22:53,340 --> 00:22:55,380 He, when he reads it says that he thinks 419 00:22:55,380 --> 00:22:58,260 it may have been put together by a tartan weaver, 420 00:22:58,260 --> 00:23:00,900 trying to drum up trade and, in effect, 421 00:23:00,900 --> 00:23:03,820 trying to sort of swath the whole country in tartan. 422 00:23:03,820 --> 00:23:06,660 MUSIC 423 00:23:12,260 --> 00:23:16,100 The Vestiarium Scoticum was not the work of a weaver. 424 00:23:16,100 --> 00:23:20,260 It had been written by two brothers, the sons of a Welsh naval officer. 425 00:23:20,260 --> 00:23:25,060 They had been born in Surrey and christened John and Charles Allen. 426 00:23:25,060 --> 00:23:28,100 But by the time Scott got a glimpse of their work, 427 00:23:28,100 --> 00:23:31,060 they'd already changed their names several times. 428 00:23:34,940 --> 00:23:39,060 In the 1830s, they changed their name once more 429 00:23:39,060 --> 00:23:42,220 to John and Charles Sobieski Stuart. 430 00:23:43,500 --> 00:23:46,620 I'm sure, when they started off, they didn't think they were really 431 00:23:46,620 --> 00:23:49,900 Bonnie Prince Charlie's legitimate grandchildren. 432 00:23:49,900 --> 00:23:52,620 But the more they pretended, the realer it became. 433 00:23:54,340 --> 00:23:57,140 The Scottish gentry took to the Sobieski Stuarts 434 00:23:57,140 --> 00:23:59,780 with surprising alacrity. 435 00:23:59,780 --> 00:24:03,020 Lord Lovat offered them the use of a house on Eilean Aigas, 436 00:24:03,020 --> 00:24:05,460 a private island in the River Beauly, 437 00:24:05,460 --> 00:24:07,820 somewhere to the West of Inverness. 438 00:24:07,820 --> 00:24:10,540 The house is rather hard to find. 439 00:24:10,540 --> 00:24:14,580 There's something wonderfully and ironically appropriate 440 00:24:14,580 --> 00:24:17,860 about how well hidden Eilean Aigas is 441 00:24:17,860 --> 00:24:21,140 because the Sobieski Stuarts, who lived here, 442 00:24:21,140 --> 00:24:24,940 in some way are the hidden history of how two lads from Surrey 443 00:24:24,940 --> 00:24:28,380 invented what the world thinks of as Scottishness. 444 00:24:30,500 --> 00:24:33,620 Can we actually see the hunting lodge from here? 445 00:24:37,100 --> 00:24:38,140 No. 446 00:24:39,580 --> 00:24:42,420 Can we actually see any of it from here? 447 00:24:49,060 --> 00:24:52,660 Gosh that water is so black down there. 448 00:24:52,660 --> 00:24:56,980 You know, it looks like the archetypal Scottishness, 449 00:24:56,980 --> 00:24:59,500 this deep gorge, these Scots pines. 450 00:24:59,500 --> 00:25:02,140 You couldn't have a more perfect image 451 00:25:02,140 --> 00:25:04,340 of what the world thinks Scotland is like, 452 00:25:04,340 --> 00:25:08,020 than this river, this forest and yet, 453 00:25:08,020 --> 00:25:11,860 it's the...it's the centrepiece 454 00:25:11,860 --> 00:25:16,060 of how fake Scottish identity can be. 455 00:25:28,340 --> 00:25:31,060 This is Vestiarium Scoticum, 456 00:25:31,060 --> 00:25:35,060 which was a brilliant work by the Sobieski Stuarts. 457 00:25:35,060 --> 00:25:37,900 Most of it is false. 458 00:25:37,900 --> 00:25:41,020 But we don't know which bits are false. 459 00:25:41,020 --> 00:25:44,060 They produced tartan, beautiful tartan designs, 460 00:25:44,060 --> 00:25:47,500 and even allocated tartans to families, 461 00:25:47,500 --> 00:25:49,740 particularly down in the Scottish borders, 462 00:25:49,740 --> 00:25:51,580 who'd never had a tartan before, 463 00:25:51,580 --> 00:25:53,780 and, of course, they were delighted, 464 00:25:53,780 --> 00:25:56,020 because they were no longer disadvantaged 465 00:25:56,020 --> 00:25:59,060 compared to their Highland cousins. 466 00:25:59,060 --> 00:26:01,820 So I think what happens with the Sobieski Stuarts is, you know, 467 00:26:01,820 --> 00:26:04,100 they look, and they forget a lot of families too, 468 00:26:04,100 --> 00:26:07,380 and they've got a systematic view of who should be included 469 00:26:07,380 --> 00:26:11,780 and there are a lot of gaps, so they fill them in 470 00:26:11,780 --> 00:26:13,660 with what they should look like! 471 00:26:15,380 --> 00:26:17,860 Here we have the Dress Stuart. 472 00:26:21,300 --> 00:26:26,300 Even though, erm, Walter Scott cast serious doubt 473 00:26:26,300 --> 00:26:29,220 on the veracity of this, 474 00:26:29,220 --> 00:26:31,220 people accepted them. 475 00:26:31,220 --> 00:26:34,740 It was just, came along at the right time, 476 00:26:34,740 --> 00:26:38,420 and most of these tartans are the ones that we have today, 477 00:26:38,420 --> 00:26:41,460 for clan tartans. 478 00:26:41,460 --> 00:26:43,820 MacDonald of the Isles. 479 00:26:43,820 --> 00:26:46,500 There's MacLeod, the loud MacLeod. 480 00:26:49,980 --> 00:26:51,540 Clan Ross. 481 00:26:51,540 --> 00:26:53,780 Rosses are very lucky, they've got a lot of options. 482 00:26:53,780 --> 00:26:55,340 You've got this bright option. 483 00:26:55,340 --> 00:26:57,100 Muted Ross, which is stunning. 484 00:26:57,100 --> 00:26:58,340 Then you've got Red Rosses. 485 00:26:58,340 --> 00:27:00,660 But then you've also got the weathered range as well. 486 00:27:00,660 --> 00:27:05,700 So this here is absolutely gorgeous in the weathered. 487 00:27:05,700 --> 00:27:10,380 That's, that's...That is the same tartan as that. 488 00:27:10,380 --> 00:27:13,100 But then you also get dress tartans as well. 489 00:27:13,100 --> 00:27:15,220 So there's Red Ross again. 490 00:27:15,220 --> 00:27:17,260 That's another version of Red Ross, and then, 491 00:27:17,260 --> 00:27:19,060 that's another version of Red Ross. 492 00:27:19,060 --> 00:27:20,900 The more of these lines you have, 493 00:27:20,900 --> 00:27:23,700 the more segmented the market is, 494 00:27:23,700 --> 00:27:27,780 the more potential there is to stratify the market 495 00:27:27,780 --> 00:27:29,700 and to reach the widest market possible. 496 00:27:29,700 --> 00:27:32,060 I mean, after all, some people might be entitled 497 00:27:32,060 --> 00:27:33,780 to three different family setts. 498 00:27:33,780 --> 00:27:37,460 They might want them all, depending on the social function they're at! 499 00:27:37,460 --> 00:27:40,460 I would try and push people to Muted Hunting Ross, 500 00:27:40,460 --> 00:27:42,820 as opposed to that, because it is pretty garish. 501 00:27:42,820 --> 00:27:45,060 But then again if you stick it with a jacket like that, 502 00:27:45,060 --> 00:27:46,860 it's going to look absolutely stunning. 503 00:27:46,860 --> 00:27:52,380 Fraser and that's exactly the same as it is today. 504 00:27:52,380 --> 00:27:55,140 This top one here is modern Red Fraser. 505 00:27:55,140 --> 00:27:56,860 Quite vibrant in its colours. 506 00:27:56,860 --> 00:27:59,740 Now, some people call these tartans the dress tartans as well. 507 00:27:59,740 --> 00:28:00,980 You know, in some cases, 508 00:28:00,980 --> 00:28:03,820 they're taking hints from contiguous or related families, 509 00:28:03,820 --> 00:28:06,140 or hunting tartan, 510 00:28:06,140 --> 00:28:09,180 or they're interpreting a dress tartan from a hunting tartan. 511 00:28:09,180 --> 00:28:12,620 And here we have it here, this is modern Hunting Fraser, much darker. 512 00:28:12,620 --> 00:28:14,100 Or they're inventing the fact 513 00:28:14,100 --> 00:28:16,740 that there were different hunting and dress and so on, tartans. 514 00:28:16,740 --> 00:28:18,540 Still follows the same sett, 515 00:28:18,540 --> 00:28:21,180 same pattern as the red and the orange one, 516 00:28:21,180 --> 00:28:24,020 but it's darker in colour because obviously it's a hunting tartan. 517 00:28:24,020 --> 00:28:27,980 But, often, they're just making it up?! 518 00:28:29,220 --> 00:28:30,540 Wallace. 519 00:28:32,380 --> 00:28:34,260 Nothing to do with William. 520 00:28:36,420 --> 00:28:41,300 MacQueen, and, of course, that's been used to a huge degree 521 00:28:41,300 --> 00:28:45,780 by Alexander MacQueen in very many of his modern fashion. 522 00:28:47,580 --> 00:28:49,060 And Bruce. 523 00:28:49,060 --> 00:28:52,860 We'd hate anyone to think that Robert the Bruce wore that tartan 524 00:28:52,860 --> 00:28:57,300 because that would be chronologically impossible. 525 00:28:57,300 --> 00:29:00,260 They just got a bee in their bonnet about tartans, 526 00:29:00,260 --> 00:29:03,020 and they followed it through quite brilliantly, 527 00:29:03,020 --> 00:29:06,620 they took some existing tartans and modified the design. 528 00:29:06,620 --> 00:29:10,660 In some cases, the whole tartan was pure invention. 529 00:29:10,660 --> 00:29:12,820 They're making history. 530 00:29:12,820 --> 00:29:16,260 It's the creation of a charismatic textile 531 00:29:16,260 --> 00:29:19,060 by a process of fictionalisation. 532 00:29:19,060 --> 00:29:22,540 They talked about ancient manuscripts in France 533 00:29:22,540 --> 00:29:25,300 and manuscripts in other places, 534 00:29:25,300 --> 00:29:29,620 but they were never able to actually produce the manuscripts, 535 00:29:29,620 --> 00:29:31,900 which really just confirmed what Walter Scott 536 00:29:31,900 --> 00:29:35,340 and many other serious historians thought at the time. 537 00:29:35,340 --> 00:29:36,620 Which was? 538 00:29:36,620 --> 00:29:38,500 Which was that they were fakes. 539 00:29:38,500 --> 00:29:41,060 But God bless them! 540 00:29:41,060 --> 00:29:49,060 # Peaceful flows the winding river 541 00:29:49,060 --> 00:29:56,580 # By the weeping willow tree... # 542 00:29:59,020 --> 00:30:02,820 The Sobieski Stuarts quite cleverly go to ground for a decade 543 00:30:02,820 --> 00:30:07,460 before they actually reveal the whole book, once Scott is dead. 544 00:30:07,460 --> 00:30:09,220 Once the person who really knows 545 00:30:09,220 --> 00:30:10,980 that this must be a fake is out the way, 546 00:30:10,980 --> 00:30:12,580 that's when they bring it back. 547 00:30:12,580 --> 00:30:15,180 Well, we've come round to the other side of the island 548 00:30:15,180 --> 00:30:18,340 and just beyond the pylon, you can see Eilean Aigas, 549 00:30:18,340 --> 00:30:20,620 the house where the Sobieski Stuarts lived. 550 00:30:20,620 --> 00:30:22,180 Some of the tartans they invented 551 00:30:22,180 --> 00:30:23,980 would have been invented on that island. 552 00:30:23,980 --> 00:30:25,660 Not quite sure which ones, 553 00:30:25,660 --> 00:30:28,100 but there's a good chance at least one of them was there. 554 00:30:28,100 --> 00:30:29,980 Scott. 555 00:30:29,980 --> 00:30:32,660 I think one that they probably definitely did there 556 00:30:32,660 --> 00:30:34,060 was the Scott tartan. 557 00:30:34,060 --> 00:30:37,180 When they spoke to Walter Scott and showed him this book, 558 00:30:37,180 --> 00:30:39,380 he was well aware that it was phoney, 559 00:30:39,380 --> 00:30:42,900 and in a kind of revenge they invented a Scott tartan 560 00:30:42,900 --> 00:30:44,580 and maybe that whole fantasy 561 00:30:44,580 --> 00:30:46,820 of them being the heirs to the British throne 562 00:30:46,820 --> 00:30:50,020 began with Scott's rather pursed-lipped critique 563 00:30:50,020 --> 00:30:51,380 of their behaviour. 564 00:30:54,580 --> 00:30:58,420 Elizabeth Grant of Rothiemurchus, the great 19th century diarist, 565 00:30:58,420 --> 00:31:00,660 claims that the Sobieski Stuarts 566 00:31:00,660 --> 00:31:02,740 actually reigned in the north country. 567 00:31:02,740 --> 00:31:04,460 She describes how they built 568 00:31:04,460 --> 00:31:06,740 an artificial waterfall on this island, 569 00:31:06,740 --> 00:31:09,140 where the wife of the elder of the Sobieski Stuarts 570 00:31:09,140 --> 00:31:11,340 would sit playing a harp. 571 00:31:11,340 --> 00:31:13,940 It's a kind of Disneyfied version of Scotland. 572 00:31:13,940 --> 00:31:17,100 If you're looking for where the Brigadoon idea of Scotland starts, 573 00:31:17,100 --> 00:31:19,140 it's on that island. 574 00:31:19,140 --> 00:31:24,660 MUSIC 575 00:31:28,900 --> 00:31:33,060 Two years after the publication of Vestiarium Scoticum, 576 00:31:33,060 --> 00:31:35,380 the Sobieski Stuarts produced the equally lavish 577 00:31:35,380 --> 00:31:37,020 Costumes of the Clans. 578 00:31:37,020 --> 00:31:42,020 MUSIC 579 00:31:42,020 --> 00:31:45,860 In it, they claimed that the Vestiarium had now been firmly dated 580 00:31:45,860 --> 00:31:47,500 to the 16th century, 581 00:31:47,500 --> 00:31:50,580 and produced images of how tartans, trews and kilts 582 00:31:50,580 --> 00:31:54,220 would have been worn by Scots in times gone by. 583 00:31:54,220 --> 00:31:55,900 It's quite convincing. 584 00:31:55,900 --> 00:31:59,580 There's a splendid set of hose tops on this character's... 585 00:31:59,580 --> 00:32:03,380 Lovely trews cut on the cross. 586 00:32:03,380 --> 00:32:04,740 Tremendous. 587 00:32:04,740 --> 00:32:07,740 Imagine being allowed to dress like that for parties. 588 00:32:07,740 --> 00:32:10,860 Every single tartan shop on the Royal Mile 589 00:32:10,860 --> 00:32:12,500 still uses their patterns. 590 00:32:12,500 --> 00:32:15,660 What's really remarkable isn't just they invented it, 591 00:32:15,660 --> 00:32:17,940 but that we swallowed it so wholeheartedly. 592 00:32:19,460 --> 00:32:21,660 I think people like to have rules and regulations 593 00:32:21,660 --> 00:32:24,540 and believe things are authentic, don't they, 594 00:32:24,540 --> 00:32:26,900 and how it's done, people don't really like change 595 00:32:26,900 --> 00:32:29,020 and they like to think it was always done like that 596 00:32:29,020 --> 00:32:30,620 and they're doing the right thing. 597 00:32:30,620 --> 00:32:32,820 It's convention, isn't it! 598 00:32:32,820 --> 00:32:36,700 So you can see why people bought into it. They're rather good. 599 00:32:36,700 --> 00:32:39,540 But also terribly good for the textile industry, don't you think? 600 00:32:39,540 --> 00:32:41,900 There's a lot of cloth in some of these, so, you know, 601 00:32:41,900 --> 00:32:44,900 if you can persuade somebody that that's what they need to be wearing, 602 00:32:44,900 --> 00:32:46,460 it's got to be good for business. 603 00:32:48,100 --> 00:32:50,140 But weren't they just a bit naughty? 604 00:32:50,140 --> 00:32:53,580 And what was wrong with that? What was wrong with being naughty? 605 00:32:53,580 --> 00:32:59,620 Surely the, you know... Tartan is essentially romantic, isn't it? 606 00:32:59,620 --> 00:33:03,500 And romance goes with naughtiness, at least it does in my book. 607 00:33:03,500 --> 00:33:06,860 And, I think, if we had been very Presbyterian about it, 608 00:33:06,860 --> 00:33:09,180 which we could easily have been, because that again 609 00:33:09,180 --> 00:33:11,220 is another part of Scotland's history, 610 00:33:11,220 --> 00:33:13,020 then it would have been very dull. 611 00:33:13,020 --> 00:33:16,740 MUSIC 612 00:33:43,820 --> 00:33:48,060 So here we have the grave 613 00:33:48,060 --> 00:33:52,340 of John Sobieski Stuart and Charles Edward Stuart. 614 00:33:52,340 --> 00:33:54,700 The one thing we can say with certainty 615 00:33:54,700 --> 00:33:56,740 is that the two men buried here 616 00:33:56,740 --> 00:33:59,740 were not John Sobieski Stuart and not Charles Edward Stuart. 617 00:33:59,740 --> 00:34:03,260 Their real names were John Carter Allen 618 00:34:03,260 --> 00:34:07,300 and Charles Manning Allen, born in Godalming in Surrey. 619 00:34:07,300 --> 00:34:11,180 MUSIC 620 00:34:17,860 --> 00:34:20,340 What's exciting about the Sobieski Stuarts 621 00:34:20,340 --> 00:34:23,900 is getting away from this idea that our national myths must be true. 622 00:34:23,900 --> 00:34:25,460 If you can re-write the myth, 623 00:34:25,460 --> 00:34:29,260 you stand a good chance of being able to change your history 624 00:34:29,260 --> 00:34:30,780 to change your future, 625 00:34:30,780 --> 00:34:35,020 to have a more inclusive, a more open-minded approach to nationalism, 626 00:34:35,020 --> 00:34:37,020 rather than these tired, old, 627 00:34:37,020 --> 00:34:41,020 sometimes rather dangerous attachments to myth. 628 00:34:41,020 --> 00:34:43,020 MUSIC 629 00:35:00,660 --> 00:35:03,340 A few tens of miles to the south-east of Eilean Aigas, 630 00:35:03,340 --> 00:35:04,660 in Speyside, 631 00:35:04,660 --> 00:35:07,100 the re-branded Hanoverians, the Windsors, 632 00:35:07,100 --> 00:35:10,220 were embarking on an equally fictional project. 633 00:35:14,140 --> 00:35:16,100 Both Victoria and Albert loved Scotland 634 00:35:16,100 --> 00:35:18,020 and everything it now stood for. 635 00:35:18,020 --> 00:35:21,420 They had a lot more money to spend than the Sobieski Stuarts 636 00:35:21,420 --> 00:35:24,620 and tartan was the answer to almost every question 637 00:35:24,620 --> 00:35:26,740 as far as design was concerned. 638 00:35:26,740 --> 00:35:30,260 Curtains and carpets were tartan. 639 00:35:30,260 --> 00:35:33,020 Seats and servants wore similar costumes. 640 00:35:34,980 --> 00:35:37,260 Like a cheery virus, 641 00:35:37,260 --> 00:35:39,660 tartan spread outwards from Balmoral, 642 00:35:39,660 --> 00:35:42,060 and to the Queen's enormous satisfaction, 643 00:35:42,060 --> 00:35:44,500 infected the local aristocracy. 644 00:35:46,780 --> 00:35:47,900 Naturally enough, 645 00:35:47,900 --> 00:35:50,820 the Queen wanted some sort of visual record of it all. 646 00:35:50,820 --> 00:35:52,820 But photography was in its infancy, 647 00:35:52,820 --> 00:35:55,380 and besides, tartan's charms lay in a world of colour 648 00:35:55,380 --> 00:35:58,020 that early photographs couldn't capture. 649 00:35:59,820 --> 00:36:03,900 Well, these volumes were published by command of Queen Victoria. 650 00:36:03,900 --> 00:36:06,140 They're called, The Highlanders of Scotland. 651 00:36:06,140 --> 00:36:09,980 They're in two volumes and, er, the marvellous illustrations 652 00:36:09,980 --> 00:36:13,380 were by Kenneth MacLeay, who was a Victorian miniaturist, 653 00:36:13,380 --> 00:36:17,660 and they cost 18 guineas! 654 00:36:17,660 --> 00:36:21,420 And they contain some of the most accurate 655 00:36:21,420 --> 00:36:25,260 and beautiful portraits of highlanders. 656 00:36:25,260 --> 00:36:30,940 All the individuals here were either local worthies around Balmoral 657 00:36:30,940 --> 00:36:32,940 or were members of staff 658 00:36:32,940 --> 00:36:35,580 and they all dressed up specially for the sittings. 659 00:36:35,580 --> 00:36:37,260 But the detail is excellent. 660 00:36:37,260 --> 00:36:40,300 Because McLeay was a miniaturist, 661 00:36:40,300 --> 00:36:43,980 the tartans are painted very accurately here, 662 00:36:43,980 --> 00:36:47,980 whereas, conventionally, portrait painters 663 00:36:47,980 --> 00:36:52,660 would just do the face and the body and they would go back to the studio 664 00:36:52,660 --> 00:36:55,580 and pull out a bit of old tartan, some of them, 665 00:36:55,580 --> 00:36:57,740 and then paint the tartan on. 666 00:36:57,740 --> 00:37:00,980 But here, the tartans are extremely accurate 667 00:37:00,980 --> 00:37:05,700 and it's also very interesting to see the bits and pieces, the sporrans, 668 00:37:05,700 --> 00:37:08,460 the style of the sporrans, the swords, the belts, 669 00:37:08,460 --> 00:37:12,980 and just generally how they were, how they were dressed. 670 00:37:12,980 --> 00:37:16,860 There's another lovely one here with four of them in it. 671 00:37:16,860 --> 00:37:19,500 Ah, there we are look at that one. 672 00:37:22,020 --> 00:37:24,020 Beautiful array of tartans. 673 00:37:25,340 --> 00:37:30,020 That's, from the left, that's er John McCoughlan, Hugh Graham, 674 00:37:30,020 --> 00:37:34,100 James MacFarlane and Angus Colquhoun. 675 00:37:34,100 --> 00:37:36,060 MUSIC 676 00:37:38,900 --> 00:37:41,100 Tartan Army uniform, there's no kind of rules. 677 00:37:41,100 --> 00:37:44,020 That's the one thing with the Tartan Army, it's all very fluid. 678 00:37:44,020 --> 00:37:46,340 But you'll often find us wearing the Glengarry. 679 00:37:46,340 --> 00:37:48,460 You have to have the current Scotland strip. 680 00:37:48,460 --> 00:37:49,660 That's a requirement. 681 00:37:49,660 --> 00:37:52,140 Then, obviously, as a girl, I wear the mini-kilt. 682 00:37:52,140 --> 00:37:54,980 This is my family tartan, which is Anderson, 683 00:37:54,980 --> 00:37:58,260 and it means I can easily spot fellow Andersons in the crowd. 684 00:37:58,260 --> 00:38:02,340 DRUMBEATS AND BAGPIPES 685 00:38:02,340 --> 00:38:04,780 The association between tartan and the Army 686 00:38:04,780 --> 00:38:07,460 grew stronger throughout Victoria's reign. 687 00:38:07,460 --> 00:38:09,580 As the Empire reached its fullest extent, 688 00:38:09,580 --> 00:38:11,900 the kilted soldiers of the Highland regiments 689 00:38:11,900 --> 00:38:13,900 were always in the vanguard... 690 00:38:13,900 --> 00:38:16,780 MUSIC 691 00:38:19,180 --> 00:38:21,300 ..wherever the action was hottest 692 00:38:21,300 --> 00:38:25,820 and lives were expended in proper imperial style. 693 00:38:25,820 --> 00:38:28,340 This is one of the most important pieces 694 00:38:28,340 --> 00:38:30,620 of Scottish military iconography 695 00:38:30,620 --> 00:38:32,380 and it features an incident 696 00:38:32,380 --> 00:38:36,860 during the battle of Balaclava in the Crimean War, 1854. 697 00:38:36,860 --> 00:38:41,300 And what we see here is the famous Thin Red Line. 698 00:38:41,300 --> 00:38:43,620 The 93rd Highlanders, 699 00:38:43,620 --> 00:38:46,700 who'd been tasked by their commanding general, 700 00:38:46,700 --> 00:38:48,420 General Colin Campbell, 701 00:38:48,420 --> 00:38:53,380 to defend this piece of land against the attacking Russian cavalry. 702 00:38:53,380 --> 00:38:57,180 Campbell said to them in no uncertain terms before the battle began, 703 00:38:57,180 --> 00:39:01,300 "There is no retreat from here men. You must die where you stand." 704 00:39:01,300 --> 00:39:05,140 And when the painting was produced and shown to the wider public, 705 00:39:05,140 --> 00:39:10,860 it seals for ever the great notion of the Highland soldier. 706 00:39:10,860 --> 00:39:14,700 I mean, look at them here, wearing their government kilts, 707 00:39:14,700 --> 00:39:19,300 ostrich-feathered bonnets, spats, diced hose. 708 00:39:19,300 --> 00:39:24,340 They are the epitome of the courage of the Victorian soldier 709 00:39:24,340 --> 00:39:26,060 and they're Highlanders. 710 00:39:26,060 --> 00:39:28,460 MUSIC 711 00:39:35,820 --> 00:39:37,900 It's largely hokum, I'm afraid to say. 712 00:39:37,900 --> 00:39:41,220 This rifle they're using, the Minie rifle, killed over a long distance. 713 00:39:41,220 --> 00:39:43,900 So, the Russian cavalry would have been nowhere near them. 714 00:39:43,900 --> 00:39:46,340 They would have been well back down the battlefield. 715 00:39:51,620 --> 00:39:53,860 So firm did the association become 716 00:39:53,860 --> 00:39:57,660 between glamorous military action and the Highland regiments, 717 00:39:57,660 --> 00:40:00,700 that the Scottish Lowland regiments sought to emulate them. 718 00:40:02,380 --> 00:40:05,420 They stopped short of wearing the kilt, 719 00:40:05,420 --> 00:40:09,660 but they took to tartan wherever else they could. 720 00:40:09,660 --> 00:40:14,180 Scottish Lowland regiments started wearing tartan trews, 721 00:40:14,180 --> 00:40:16,300 feathered bonnets, Highland doublets. 722 00:40:16,300 --> 00:40:18,860 Their officers carried claymores. 723 00:40:18,860 --> 00:40:22,780 In fact, they were dressed in a pastiche of the Highland soldier 724 00:40:22,780 --> 00:40:25,740 which was totally and utterly ridiculous. 725 00:40:25,740 --> 00:40:28,820 Because a lot of these Highland regiments were the descendants 726 00:40:28,820 --> 00:40:32,100 of people who had fought under Prince Charles at Culloden 727 00:40:32,100 --> 00:40:35,900 and the Lowland regiments were amongst those who had to put it down. 728 00:40:35,900 --> 00:40:39,420 And lo and behold, what we have are the Lowland regiments 729 00:40:39,420 --> 00:40:41,460 aping their Highland brothers, 730 00:40:41,460 --> 00:40:45,260 whereas 150 years earlier, they would have dismissed these people 731 00:40:45,260 --> 00:40:49,580 as bare-arsed banditti wearing kilts and nothing under them. 732 00:40:49,580 --> 00:40:52,980 MUSIC 733 00:40:54,060 --> 00:40:56,780 By the second half of the 19th century, 734 00:40:56,780 --> 00:41:00,260 tartan was telling tales of British military supremacy. 735 00:41:03,740 --> 00:41:07,300 MUSIC 736 00:41:07,300 --> 00:41:10,620 The first war photographers captured them too. 737 00:41:10,620 --> 00:41:13,260 Blunt instruments of imperial policy 738 00:41:13,260 --> 00:41:15,180 in ceremonial Highland dress. 739 00:41:17,140 --> 00:41:22,620 At home, tartan spoke of your aristocratic background, 740 00:41:22,620 --> 00:41:25,660 or your role as a servant to the aristocracy. 741 00:41:27,300 --> 00:41:29,540 It was the very fabric of the establishment. 742 00:41:31,780 --> 00:41:34,340 In the Highlands themselves, people reacted quite strongly 743 00:41:34,340 --> 00:41:36,500 against the elevation of the kilt and the tartans, 744 00:41:36,500 --> 00:41:39,180 because they saw it as being associated with the regiments, 745 00:41:39,180 --> 00:41:41,940 who would be marched off to war, for young men to go off and die. 746 00:41:41,940 --> 00:41:44,780 They also saw it as being something which was a plaything 747 00:41:44,780 --> 00:41:47,700 of the lairds and the kind of ruling classes. 748 00:41:47,700 --> 00:41:49,900 Most of them didn't wear kilts or tartan, 749 00:41:49,900 --> 00:41:52,220 they wore trousers, quite sensibly. 750 00:41:52,220 --> 00:41:55,340 Those who wore Highland dress were very privileged. 751 00:41:55,340 --> 00:41:58,340 They were the gentry of the country, 752 00:41:58,340 --> 00:42:00,220 the vast majority of them. 753 00:42:00,220 --> 00:42:03,540 Only they could afford the hugely expensive outfits. 754 00:42:03,540 --> 00:42:10,180 They obviously wanted to guard that jealously and zealously 755 00:42:10,180 --> 00:42:17,100 and a whole series of fashion rules grew up over the decades, 756 00:42:17,100 --> 00:42:20,100 particularly during Victoria's time. 757 00:42:20,100 --> 00:42:22,900 That you must do this and you mustn't do that, 758 00:42:22,900 --> 00:42:26,620 and you could only wear a tartan if your surname was that of the clan 759 00:42:26,620 --> 00:42:28,620 whose tartan you were wearing. 760 00:42:28,620 --> 00:42:30,460 But just looking at it historically, 761 00:42:30,460 --> 00:42:35,060 there is no reason why such rules and regulations should exist. 762 00:42:35,060 --> 00:42:37,700 I've had to kind of create my own rules and etiquette 763 00:42:37,700 --> 00:42:40,500 to what I'm doing and how the kilt should sit. 764 00:42:40,500 --> 00:42:45,140 So, a traditional kilt, and this is more the Victorian era kilt, 765 00:42:45,140 --> 00:42:50,060 the military version, being eight yards, very, very tight and high, 766 00:42:50,060 --> 00:42:54,420 was all about military clothing and very, very smart and formal. 767 00:42:54,420 --> 00:42:58,580 So, what I did, and this happened up a mountain in Israel, 768 00:42:58,580 --> 00:43:01,260 I just got a bit sick because the kilt was so high and tight, 769 00:43:01,260 --> 00:43:03,340 but I lowered it and wore it on my hip. 770 00:43:03,340 --> 00:43:05,380 But then the kilt was too long at the other end, 771 00:43:05,380 --> 00:43:07,340 so, I dropped about an inch and a half 772 00:43:07,340 --> 00:43:09,220 off my own personal kilt length. 773 00:43:09,220 --> 00:43:11,900 So, I go from the hip bone to the top of the knee. 774 00:43:11,900 --> 00:43:15,340 So, that's the formal height is onto the kneecap, 775 00:43:15,340 --> 00:43:17,380 well, Queen Victoria's formal height, 776 00:43:17,380 --> 00:43:19,220 before that it was actually worn longer. 777 00:43:19,220 --> 00:43:22,540 She was a bit pervy and wanted to see more leg and that stuck. 778 00:43:22,540 --> 00:43:25,900 MUSIC 779 00:43:32,940 --> 00:43:34,700 With every year that passed, 780 00:43:34,700 --> 00:43:37,980 Scotland's aristocracy made up more and more elaborate, 781 00:43:37,980 --> 00:43:41,460 unbreakable rules controlling the wearing of tartan. 782 00:43:48,060 --> 00:43:50,260 And Scottish soldiers in kilts and tartan trews 783 00:43:50,260 --> 00:43:54,340 continued to lose their lives in foreign parts and places. 784 00:43:59,820 --> 00:44:02,660 Somehow, the image was part of the arsenal. 785 00:44:02,660 --> 00:44:06,140 The kilted soldier was as bizarre and unsettling to the enemy 786 00:44:06,140 --> 00:44:07,540 as the skirl of the pipes. 787 00:44:13,860 --> 00:44:16,740 But in the trenches of the First World War, 788 00:44:16,740 --> 00:44:19,700 the kilt was a beloved liability. 789 00:44:19,700 --> 00:44:21,180 It caught on barbed wire, 790 00:44:21,180 --> 00:44:22,700 became muddy and waterlogged, 791 00:44:22,700 --> 00:44:26,460 provided little or no protection from corrosive mustard gas. 792 00:44:37,860 --> 00:44:39,420 One of the many casualties 793 00:44:39,420 --> 00:44:42,620 was the son of music hall star, Harry Lauder. 794 00:44:45,380 --> 00:44:47,980 # Roamin' in the gloamin' 795 00:44:47,980 --> 00:44:50,180 # On the bonnie banks o' Clyde 796 00:44:50,180 --> 00:44:52,340 # Roamin' in the gloamin' 797 00:44:52,340 --> 00:44:54,700 # Wi' ma lassie by ma side 798 00:44:54,700 --> 00:44:56,580 # When the sun has gone to rest 799 00:44:56,580 --> 00:44:58,900 # That's the time that I like best 800 00:44:58,900 --> 00:45:01,300 # O, it's lovely roamin'. # 801 00:45:01,300 --> 00:45:03,700 Now the chorus, everybody, hey! 802 00:45:03,700 --> 00:45:05,940 # Roamin' in the gloamin... # 803 00:45:05,940 --> 00:45:08,500 Never in the history of human tailoring 804 00:45:08,500 --> 00:45:11,980 has so much cloth been used to so little purposeful effect. 805 00:45:11,980 --> 00:45:16,060 You've got nine yards of material which doesn't keep your legs warm. 806 00:45:16,060 --> 00:45:18,140 It has no useful function. 807 00:45:21,900 --> 00:45:25,660 We see a Scotch comedian sucking up to the Prime Minister. 808 00:45:25,660 --> 00:45:30,940 There's a sense in which Winston Churchill looks slightly bemused 809 00:45:30,940 --> 00:45:33,100 by the attention he's getting. 810 00:45:33,100 --> 00:45:35,220 But that's not to get away from the fact 811 00:45:35,220 --> 00:45:39,380 that Lauder made a massive contribution in the Second World War, 812 00:45:39,380 --> 00:45:41,500 but especially in the First World War. 813 00:45:41,500 --> 00:45:46,300 He was knighted for his services primarily for troop morale 814 00:45:46,300 --> 00:45:50,340 and a large of that was because of his kilted persona. 815 00:45:50,340 --> 00:45:54,100 He appears in shows in the West End of London. 816 00:45:54,100 --> 00:45:57,020 There's one called The Laddies Who Fought and Won, 817 00:45:57,020 --> 00:45:59,700 which the finale was the kilted Highlanders 818 00:45:59,700 --> 00:46:01,500 all marching up onto the stage. 819 00:46:01,500 --> 00:46:03,540 In some senses it was very kitschy, 820 00:46:03,540 --> 00:46:06,460 but in the other senses, it was actually very moving. 821 00:46:06,460 --> 00:46:08,460 # There's a dear old lady 822 00:46:08,460 --> 00:46:10,300 # Mother Britain is her name 823 00:46:10,300 --> 00:46:15,340 # And she's all the world to me... # 824 00:46:15,340 --> 00:46:17,420 This small, sort of wizened man in a kilt 825 00:46:17,420 --> 00:46:21,620 did speak for the British soldier more generally 826 00:46:21,620 --> 00:46:24,420 as well as, specifically, the Scottish soldier. 827 00:46:24,420 --> 00:46:27,300 # The lasses were beloving of their laddies 828 00:46:27,300 --> 00:46:31,860 # The laddies who fought our war. # 829 00:46:31,860 --> 00:46:34,940 CHEERING 830 00:46:34,940 --> 00:46:40,380 Lauder was marmite. The Unionist faithful enjoyed him at face value. 831 00:46:40,380 --> 00:46:42,780 But to those who sought home rule for Scotland, 832 00:46:42,780 --> 00:46:44,780 Lauder was an embarrassing grotesque, 833 00:46:44,780 --> 00:46:45,860 a kilted jackass, 834 00:46:45,860 --> 00:46:49,860 a Lowlander whose stage persona made mock of Scotland and its people. 835 00:46:54,620 --> 00:46:56,980 Lauder was loathed with particular intensity 836 00:46:56,980 --> 00:47:01,340 by one of the founders in 1928 of the Scottish National Party, 837 00:47:01,340 --> 00:47:03,220 the poet Hugh MacDiarmid, 838 00:47:05,380 --> 00:47:09,660 real name, Christopher Murray Grieve, a Lowlander himself, 839 00:47:09,660 --> 00:47:10,980 born in Langholm, 840 00:47:10,980 --> 00:47:15,260 a little less than 15 miles inside the Scottish border. 841 00:47:15,260 --> 00:47:17,860 And he, at the beginning of 1922, 842 00:47:17,860 --> 00:47:22,140 is even writing diatribes against the use of dialect Scots. 843 00:47:22,140 --> 00:47:24,060 To some extent you might describe him, 844 00:47:24,060 --> 00:47:26,620 if slightly unfairly, as a minor English poet. 845 00:47:26,620 --> 00:47:29,460 And somehow he got converted to the idea of dialect Scots. 846 00:47:29,460 --> 00:47:33,700 The only way he could effect a Scottish national literary renaissance 847 00:47:33,700 --> 00:47:39,420 was to adopt a Highland persona, take on the name of Hugh MacDiarmid 848 00:47:39,420 --> 00:47:44,940 and develop a form of poetry which uses a synthetic Scots, 849 00:47:44,940 --> 00:47:47,700 a Scots which no-one had ever spoke before, 850 00:47:47,700 --> 00:47:51,700 but which he thought epitomised the essence of Scottish culture, 851 00:47:51,700 --> 00:47:53,700 and in some senses the kind of the language, 852 00:47:53,700 --> 00:47:56,300 the synthetic Scots that MacDiarmid develops 853 00:47:56,300 --> 00:47:59,420 is not unlike a form of linguistic tartan in itself. 854 00:48:01,180 --> 00:48:04,340 MUSIC 855 00:48:13,340 --> 00:48:16,180 No' her, wha in the how-dumb-deid o' nicht 856 00:48:16,180 --> 00:48:19,260 Kyths like Eternity in Time's despite. 857 00:48:19,260 --> 00:48:24,300 No' her, withooten shape, wha's name is Daith, 858 00:48:24,300 --> 00:48:28,460 No' Him, unkennable abies to faith 859 00:48:28,460 --> 00:48:31,060 God whom, gin e'er He saw a man, 'ud be 860 00:48:31,060 --> 00:48:34,060 E'en mair dumfooner'd at the sicht than he. 861 00:48:36,100 --> 00:48:39,140 MacDiarmid felt that the performance of the persona 862 00:48:39,140 --> 00:48:40,940 that he had developed in 1922 863 00:48:40,940 --> 00:48:44,900 was an important strategy in creating a more serious idea of Scotland, 864 00:48:44,900 --> 00:48:47,500 and he actually said in his letters 865 00:48:47,500 --> 00:48:49,780 that he was deliberately being humourless, 866 00:48:49,780 --> 00:48:54,540 because this is something, that he felt his purpose was so strong, 867 00:48:54,540 --> 00:48:57,580 that it couldn't be deflected by humour. 868 00:48:57,580 --> 00:48:59,860 So Hugh MacDiarmid is a fiction? 869 00:48:59,860 --> 00:49:03,100 Yes, again, this is a very contentious issue in Scottish culture, 870 00:49:03,100 --> 00:49:05,060 the extent to which Scottish culture 871 00:49:05,060 --> 00:49:10,820 is always being re-invented by persona who are not in fact real. 872 00:49:10,820 --> 00:49:16,220 MUSIC: The Campbells are Coming 873 00:49:20,100 --> 00:49:24,300 Innes of Learney was real enough. 874 00:49:24,300 --> 00:49:29,940 Between 1945 and 1969 he was Lord Lyon King of Arms. 875 00:49:29,940 --> 00:49:33,340 It was his job to faithfully register coats of arms, 876 00:49:33,340 --> 00:49:36,460 the heraldic identities of Scotland's aristocracy, 877 00:49:36,460 --> 00:49:38,460 tartan included. 878 00:49:38,460 --> 00:49:43,300 MUSIC 879 00:49:43,300 --> 00:49:46,980 Unlike MacDiarmid, he approved of both Union and Empire. 880 00:49:46,980 --> 00:49:49,460 MUSIC 881 00:49:50,460 --> 00:49:54,980 In a robust footnote in his book, 'The Tartans of the Clans and Families of Scotland', 882 00:49:54,980 --> 00:49:57,060 he asserted that the British Empire was, 883 00:49:57,060 --> 00:49:59,620 "really the creation of the Scots, 884 00:49:59,620 --> 00:50:03,500 "for prior to the Union, England could not even retain 885 00:50:03,500 --> 00:50:06,700 "the territories which it from time to time inherited." 886 00:50:06,700 --> 00:50:11,220 And there's a lovely section here which I could read for you 887 00:50:11,220 --> 00:50:13,420 "For formal wear, 888 00:50:13,420 --> 00:50:17,540 "the Highland dress naturally lends itself to glittering ornaments, 889 00:50:17,540 --> 00:50:20,820 "cairngorms, braiding, and velvet or tartan doublets, 890 00:50:20,820 --> 00:50:22,780 "which combine with the tartans 891 00:50:22,780 --> 00:50:25,900 "that enhance the rich variety of costume which accords 892 00:50:25,900 --> 00:50:28,260 "with the history and instincts of the highlander." 893 00:50:28,260 --> 00:50:30,460 And then you really get a sense of the man, 894 00:50:30,460 --> 00:50:32,820 "Attempts by self-conscious Lowlanders 895 00:50:32,820 --> 00:50:37,580 "to convert the picturesque dress of the Gael into a 'quiet style' 896 00:50:37,580 --> 00:50:39,940 "and to deprive the garb of its ornament 897 00:50:39,940 --> 00:50:41,900 "or reduce it to the drab monotony 898 00:50:41,900 --> 00:50:46,700 "of Anglo Saxon evening clothes are un-Scottish and contemptible." 899 00:50:46,700 --> 00:50:50,660 MUSIC 900 00:50:54,020 --> 00:50:56,780 It's entirely appropriate that the tartan of Learney's own clan 901 00:50:56,780 --> 00:50:58,620 was a slap in the eye. 902 00:51:02,020 --> 00:51:06,140 For Innes of Learney, tartan was a sign of Scottish superiority, 903 00:51:06,140 --> 00:51:08,940 a costume proudly worn by the natural aristocrats 904 00:51:08,940 --> 00:51:11,060 of an essentially Scottish empire. 905 00:51:14,740 --> 00:51:18,620 For MacDiarmid, tartan was a sign of independent Scottish nationhood. 906 00:51:21,260 --> 00:51:23,860 And for Walter Scott, it was the fabric through which Scots 907 00:51:23,860 --> 00:51:26,700 declared themselves loyal and subject to the Union. 908 00:51:29,780 --> 00:51:33,540 All three of these Scotlands can't be true at the same time 909 00:51:33,540 --> 00:51:35,460 but there's a tartan for them all. 910 00:51:40,180 --> 00:51:43,060 Tartan sticks to all our stories. 911 00:51:43,060 --> 00:51:45,820 And it just can't help telling them back to us. 912 00:51:45,820 --> 00:51:49,660 MUSIC 913 00:51:52,260 --> 00:51:55,300 In 2009, the Scottish Parliament 914 00:51:55,300 --> 00:51:58,580 created the Scottish Register of Tartans, 915 00:51:58,580 --> 00:52:01,460 an attempt to bring some order to the chaos. 916 00:52:01,460 --> 00:52:04,340 In the main we get a lot of people registering tartans 917 00:52:04,340 --> 00:52:05,900 for their own personal use 918 00:52:05,900 --> 00:52:10,180 so things like if they've got a forthcoming wedding coming up. 919 00:52:10,180 --> 00:52:13,260 We have the Miss Emma Halford MacLeod tartan 920 00:52:13,260 --> 00:52:16,180 and actually this one is for a marriage. 921 00:52:16,180 --> 00:52:18,860 You can imagine they wore this at their wedding. 922 00:52:18,860 --> 00:52:21,460 For years to come they'll be hoping 923 00:52:21,460 --> 00:52:23,820 their children and things wear the tartan. 924 00:52:23,820 --> 00:52:28,460 And this one, we have the UPS, one tartan which is a corporate tartan. 925 00:52:28,460 --> 00:52:32,580 Companies do register for their branding and marketing purposes. 926 00:52:32,580 --> 00:52:34,820 There's lots of different things in here. 927 00:52:34,820 --> 00:52:37,020 And Canine All Dogs tartan. 928 00:52:37,020 --> 00:52:40,940 MUSIC 929 00:52:42,660 --> 00:52:45,380 There's a searchable online database. 930 00:52:45,380 --> 00:52:48,740 It tells you, where it can, where the tartan first appeared. 931 00:52:48,740 --> 00:52:52,260 There's even a Scottish Register of Tartans tartan. 932 00:52:52,260 --> 00:52:56,220 A tartan that declares our loyalty to tartan itself. 933 00:52:56,220 --> 00:52:59,380 MUSIC 934 00:53:00,540 --> 00:53:03,580 # Wi' a hundred pipers, an' a', an' a'... # 935 00:53:03,580 --> 00:53:04,820 We've arrived, at last, 936 00:53:04,820 --> 00:53:07,500 in a world where tartan's history doesn't matter. 937 00:53:07,500 --> 00:53:11,420 # Wi' a hundred pipers, an' a', an' a'. # 938 00:53:11,420 --> 00:53:13,420 I am not really playing with history at all. 939 00:53:13,420 --> 00:53:16,020 I think of it entirely as another way of painting. 940 00:53:16,020 --> 00:53:18,860 Because I trained as a painter, I wanted to use my own colours, 941 00:53:18,860 --> 00:53:22,220 so I broke with the tradition and just started weaving 942 00:53:22,220 --> 00:53:24,940 in colours that I thought worked well together. 943 00:53:24,940 --> 00:53:28,980 MUSIC 944 00:53:28,980 --> 00:53:32,180 Because of where we live, it sounds a bit corny, 945 00:53:32,180 --> 00:53:35,620 but, I suppose, because of the landscape and the light 946 00:53:35,620 --> 00:53:41,260 it's a sort of distilled view of what's outside. 947 00:53:41,260 --> 00:53:43,100 My son is very rude and tells me 948 00:53:43,100 --> 00:53:46,020 I've been trotting out the same thing for years. 949 00:53:46,020 --> 00:53:49,980 He's absolutely right, but there's endless possibilities. I never get bored with it 950 00:53:49,980 --> 00:53:51,860 # Wi' a hundred pipers, an' a', an' a' 951 00:53:51,860 --> 00:53:54,140 # We'll up an' gie them a blaw, a blaw 952 00:53:54,140 --> 00:53:57,020 # Wi' a hundred pipers, an' a', an' a'. # 953 00:53:57,020 --> 00:54:00,140 With tartan, I like to imagine it as a painter's palette. 954 00:54:00,140 --> 00:54:03,460 It's all about it being elegant and subtle 955 00:54:03,460 --> 00:54:06,460 and a lot more weathered and muted and washed out, 956 00:54:06,460 --> 00:54:10,780 so the whole thing of say bright tartans, erm, 957 00:54:10,780 --> 00:54:13,620 like these oranges and reds, 958 00:54:13,620 --> 00:54:16,460 I tend to go more to what we call muted colours 959 00:54:16,460 --> 00:54:18,260 which is a deeper darker red. 960 00:54:18,260 --> 00:54:20,860 There's some very bright tartans. There is indeed. 961 00:54:20,860 --> 00:54:23,260 Let me just see if I can find one for you. 962 00:54:23,260 --> 00:54:27,740 Let's say the kilt was in that check, with the red. 963 00:54:27,740 --> 00:54:31,580 The jacket in that and the waistcoat and tartan, cut on the angle. 964 00:54:31,580 --> 00:54:32,780 So that you get, 965 00:54:32,780 --> 00:54:33,900 oh, it's not here, 966 00:54:33,900 --> 00:54:36,380 so, you're getting a...oh, I do have one. 967 00:54:39,100 --> 00:54:41,180 This is a MacLeod of Lewis, 968 00:54:41,180 --> 00:54:44,100 or we call this Loud MacLeod. 969 00:54:44,100 --> 00:54:45,860 And again, it's a lovely, lovely tartan. 970 00:54:45,860 --> 00:54:49,620 I would certainly wear this as a tartan suit 971 00:54:49,620 --> 00:54:52,340 because I think this is a fabulous tartan. 972 00:54:52,340 --> 00:54:54,940 It's that whole thing of just being completely timeless, 973 00:54:54,940 --> 00:54:59,980 I want my grooms, this is if time travel existed, obviously, 974 00:54:59,980 --> 00:55:03,220 to be able to go back to 1908 in their kilt outfit 975 00:55:03,220 --> 00:55:05,500 and stand and have a whisky with this guy. 976 00:55:05,500 --> 00:55:07,460 Because I know this guy from 1908 977 00:55:07,460 --> 00:55:10,340 could easily be walking about the streets today. 978 00:55:10,340 --> 00:55:14,020 This here is the 21st century tartan. 979 00:55:14,020 --> 00:55:16,940 It's a tartan suit, similar to what I'm wearing, 980 00:55:16,940 --> 00:55:19,900 slightly longer, being a three-quarter length jacket. 981 00:55:19,900 --> 00:55:23,620 The groom should be, I often use the term, Bondesque. 982 00:55:23,620 --> 00:55:26,260 You know, you want to kind of look like Bond on your wedding day, 983 00:55:26,260 --> 00:55:27,620 as much as possible. 984 00:55:27,620 --> 00:55:29,980 Just, really, everything sharp. 985 00:55:29,980 --> 00:55:33,260 This is, you know, a bit more outrageous than a kilt would be. 986 00:55:33,260 --> 00:55:35,740 This is about, you know, being a bit of a show stopper, 987 00:55:35,740 --> 00:55:38,620 getting yourself noticed for the right or the wrong reasons. 988 00:55:38,620 --> 00:55:40,420 But, that's what this is kind of about, 989 00:55:40,420 --> 00:55:42,780 it's putting yourself out there and being noticed. 990 00:55:42,780 --> 00:55:45,300 So, yeah, there's ways that you can use tartan 991 00:55:45,300 --> 00:55:47,220 but have a plain kilt. 992 00:55:47,220 --> 00:55:48,820 Tweed kilts have always existed. 993 00:55:48,820 --> 00:55:51,260 Maybe denim kilts haven't, leather kilts have 994 00:55:51,260 --> 00:55:52,620 and those are my babies. 995 00:55:52,620 --> 00:55:56,060 Even transparent PVC, but that was a definite experiment. 996 00:55:59,060 --> 00:56:02,060 What if I came in and said I wanted a tartan onesie? 997 00:56:02,060 --> 00:56:04,460 Well, never says never. 998 00:56:04,460 --> 00:56:06,860 Anything is possible at Geoffrey Tailor's. 999 00:56:10,700 --> 00:56:13,220 And there's all this debate at the moment about independence 1000 00:56:13,220 --> 00:56:14,860 and I'm always happy to say 1001 00:56:14,860 --> 00:56:17,140 I don't mind England being part of Scotland. 1002 00:56:17,140 --> 00:56:20,060 Because we have all the kind of cultural identity here anyway. 1003 00:56:20,060 --> 00:56:24,020 You know, the beautiful landscape, and, you know, the national drink 1004 00:56:24,020 --> 00:56:25,940 and the national dress. 1005 00:56:25,940 --> 00:56:28,540 I always feel sorry for English people 1006 00:56:28,540 --> 00:56:30,580 because although you look a bit daft in a kilt, 1007 00:56:30,580 --> 00:56:34,060 you look a lot more silly dressed as a Morris dancer. 1008 00:56:34,060 --> 00:56:36,940 MUSIC: Shang-a-lang by the Bay City Rollers 1009 00:56:36,940 --> 00:56:40,060 # Well we sang shang-a-lang and we ran with the gang 1010 00:56:40,060 --> 00:56:43,940 # Doin' doo wop be dooby do ay... # 1011 00:56:43,940 --> 00:56:45,460 And remember next year, 1012 00:56:45,460 --> 00:56:49,300 we have the whole nation faces the question of independence. 1013 00:56:49,300 --> 00:56:51,300 so that is the change of Scotland, 1014 00:56:51,300 --> 00:56:53,060 whether they choose independence or not 1015 00:56:53,060 --> 00:56:55,260 the Scottish psyche has changed 1016 00:56:55,260 --> 00:56:57,980 and part of it is reflected in the football fan. 1017 00:56:57,980 --> 00:57:01,980 # With the jukebox playing and every body saying that 1018 00:57:01,980 --> 00:57:06,060 # "Music like ours couldn't die." # 1019 00:57:06,060 --> 00:57:08,060 Let's hear you! 1020 00:57:08,060 --> 00:57:11,340 It's become so much the emblem of Scotland 1021 00:57:11,340 --> 00:57:16,620 in a way that no other country has this colourful image. 1022 00:57:16,620 --> 00:57:19,860 You can look at tartan and go, "That's Scotland" immediately. 1023 00:57:19,860 --> 00:57:23,820 Does it matter that its past is slightly murky? 1024 00:57:23,820 --> 00:57:26,460 No, I don't think so. 1025 00:57:26,460 --> 00:57:28,660 I think it adds to the gaiety of the nation 1026 00:57:28,660 --> 00:57:32,540 and to the importance of tartan as a cultural symbol. 1027 00:57:32,540 --> 00:57:36,860 # Aye! The children of Scotia 1028 00:57:36,860 --> 00:57:39,460 # May roam the world o'er 1029 00:57:39,460 --> 00:57:42,940 # But their thoughts aye return... # 1030 00:57:42,940 --> 00:57:46,540 Tonight, it's a symbol of defeat. 1031 00:57:46,540 --> 00:57:50,100 Scotland lose 2-1 to Wales, 1032 00:57:50,100 --> 00:57:52,860 but it doesn't matter. 1033 00:57:52,860 --> 00:57:56,420 Tartan will always have more tales to tell. 1034 00:57:56,420 --> 00:58:00,500 "This piece of McBean tartan was flown to the moon 1035 00:58:00,500 --> 00:58:04,460 "in our Apollo 12 command module Yankee Clipper. 1036 00:58:04,460 --> 00:58:08,780 "It was then transferred to our lunar module Intrepid 1037 00:58:08,780 --> 00:58:12,940 "and was landed on the moon, November 19th, 1969. 1038 00:58:12,940 --> 00:58:16,380 "I am entrusting this valuable piece of tartan history to your care, 1039 00:58:16,380 --> 00:58:19,140 "Alan Bean, lunar module pilot." 1040 00:58:19,140 --> 00:58:22,540 # And the Cameron men have a right to be proud 1041 00:58:22,540 --> 00:58:25,060 # With the Campbells and Stewarts 1042 00:58:25,060 --> 00:58:27,100 # MacLeod of MacLeod 1043 00:58:27,100 --> 00:58:29,340 # Then it's hey for the tartan 1044 00:58:29,340 --> 00:58:31,740 # And ho for the tartan 1045 00:58:31,740 --> 00:58:33,700 # The stamp O' the hielands 1046 00:58:33,700 --> 00:58:35,740 # From Skye to Dundee 1047 00:58:35,740 --> 00:58:37,980 # And it's proud I am bearing 1048 00:58:37,980 --> 00:58:40,500 # The tartan I'm wearing 1049 00:58:40,500 --> 00:58:42,660 # The pride O' my clan 1050 00:58:42,660 --> 00:58:44,940 # And the tartan for me 1051 00:58:44,940 --> 00:58:46,860 # The pride O' my clan 1052 00:58:46,860 --> 00:58:56,000 # And the tartan for me. #