An honest question

[Nathan]

It's an interesting question and one I have pondered. Your history is good, but the reason is because it's out of style and has been for a couple of hundred years. It therefore looks like a period costume rather than a traditional garment. For something to be traditional it has to be passed down from generation to generation. It can evolve through the generations and what's traditional this generation is defined by how the true tradition bearers are doing it now.

At that time, it was the custom all over Europe for men of a certain station to wear powdered wigs. Since that tradition has been broken for some time, it would be considered odd for a gentleman to start sporting a powdered wig like Bonnie Prince Charlie wore. Unless he was a UK Barrister of some sort (and even those wigs are different) he would appear to be in a period costume. If people had kept on wearing the feileadh mor from generation to generation, it wouldn't be odd. Since they stopped, it is. It's the same reason we don't wear collars like Shakespeare did - they fell out of use.

We can't arbitrarily dress as if the past 200 years just didn't happen without looking a bit eccentric.

Also, why pick 1746, our darkest hour, as the moment in time? Why not dress in a leine and brat with skin tight trews in true Gaelic fashion? The reason is because you would look absurd out of context. What about chain-mail armour? My clan loved that for a while if the statues and grave inscriptions are to be believed.

In contrast, the little kilt does have an unbroken tradition. 1) Proscription wasn't that long and lots of people lived to see it come and go. 2) The military had been wearing little kilts since well before Colloden. 3) The kilt has existed in pretty much its current form for the past 200+ years. The idea of Clan tartans sprouted from somewhat spurious soil but it was a good idea and it caught on. Certainly the idea of clans was well established in the Highlands and tartans have proved a unifying force for disparate and displaced kin.

So that's your answer. It's strange to wear beaver pelt top hats, knee length britches, Elizabethan collars, and togas unless you're at a costume party of some kind. A ren fair provides the necessary context to dress as if you're in another century. If you want to dress like a Highlander from this century, it would be best to take a look at how other Highlanders actually dress today.