Tartan Police!

[macwilkin]

In 1714 two portraits were painted of his "Champion" (i.e. body guard) and his piper wearing it, and it bears no resemblance at all to the present Grant sett. Reconstructed thread counts from the portraits vary slightly, and the reconstructed setts are known as "Grant Champion" and "Grant Piper".

Will, very interesting -- the Piper to the Grant Chief you mentioned was one William Cumming. The Cummings and the Grants were "neighbours" and at one point adversaries (Lord Strathspey still has a skull of the one of the Cumming Chiefs as a trophy at Castle Grant) before serving as pipers. I'd like to see the "Grant Piper" tartan.

Cheers,

Todd

[prattw]

Will, very interesting -- the Piper to the Grant Chief you mentioned was one William Cumming. The Cummings and the Grants were "neighbours" and at one point adversaries (Lord Strathspey still has a skull of the one of the Cumming Chiefs as a trophy at Castle Grant) before serving as pipers. I'd like to see the "Grant Piper" tartan.

Cheers,

Todd

Todd,

Greetings, Kinsman.

You can find Grant Champion on the House of Tartan tartan finder, here: http://www.house-of-tartan.scotland....se/tfinder.htp

I've only seen Grant Piper once and haven't been able to relocate it. It differs only in relative widths of the bands, and is called "Piper" only because it came from that portrait. The important fact here is that they seemingly weren't too "high church" about exact thread counts then.

I tried to paste Grant Champion here, but it isna' workin'. Just go to the House of Tartan website and use the alphabetical list.

Will

[Archangel]

Todd,

Greetings, Kinsman.

You can find Grant Champion on the House of Tartan tartan finder, here: http://www.house-of-tartan.scotland....se/tfinder.htp

I've only seen Grant Piper once and haven't been able to relocate it. It differs only in relative widths of the bands, and is called "Piper" only because it came from that portrait. The important fact here is that they seemingly weren't too "high church" about exact thread counts then.

I tried to paste Grant Champion here, but it isna' workin'. Just go to the House of Tartan website and use the alphabetical list.

Will

FWIW, Hesketh's Tartans has them as separate tartans on pages 8 and 9. Not a huge difference except that the piper's seems to be hemmed (?) in red and the champion is more tan, but the print quality is lacking.

[haukehaien]

Grant Piper (and some others) are on the Tartan Authority website here.

[M. A. C. Newsome]

My own clan, Grant, is one of the few where any hint exists of there being any specified tartan for the clan prior to the 19th century. In 1704 the Chief specified that his men were to wear "red and green broad sprigged" when serving him.

I would cuation against reading too much into this quote. Not to imply that you are guilty of this yourself, but I have seen too many people use this as "evidence" that the Grant tartan dates to 1704, or at least the Grants had some "clan tartan" in 1704.

What does this quote really tell us?

Number one, it tells us that the members of Clan Grant were not wearing a uniform tartan to begin with, or else the cheif would not have to specify that they were to wear these specific colors when they were called to the field.

Number two, it does not mention anything about a specific sett or pattern. It just asks for red and green colors, in broad stripes. This describes about half of the tartans in common production today! So this can't be read to refer to any particular tartan. Furthermore, it would seem that the clansmen were responsible for obtaining their own cloth in these colors, so I can only imagine that there was great variety among them.

Number three, it presupposes that there were no named tartans at the time, becuase if tartans did have names, he would have said, "wear the proper Grant tartan" or something like that. He would not have had to describe the colors.

In short, all we really can tell from this statement is that the cheif of the clan wanted the men fighting under him to all be outfitted in similar colors when on the field. It was an early attempt to enforce some uniformity in military dress, and for that reason is important. But it doesn't really say anything about named clan tartans existing at the time.

Aye,
Matt

[Iolaus]

It is so refreshing to have a scholar with well developed analytic skills on board.

[prattw]

I would cuation against reading too much into this quote. Not to imply that you are guilty of this yourself, but I have seen too many people use this as "evidence" that the Grant tartan dates to 1704, or at least the Grants had some "clan tartan" in 1704.

What does this quote really tell us?

Number one, it tells us that the members of Clan Grant were not wearing a uniform tartan to begin with, or else the cheif would not have to specify that they were to wear these specific colors when they were called to the field.
[snip]

Actually Matt, what I meant to imply was some of the points that you made. First, if Ludovic Grant had to describe what they were to wear, then they weren't already wearing it. Second, it bore no resemblence to any modern Grant sett. And third, the setts in two existing portraits that show men wearing it are not identical, so no more than a general "style" was intended. (After all, these were two of the Grant's personal retainers.)

Actually, looking at the figure of Grant Piper in the Tartan Authority, there's quite a bit more difference than I remembered, though. In fact, looking at the actual portraits at http://www.clangrant-us.org/art.htm there's a good bit more difference in the reconstructed tartans than the portraits. In fact, neither of the recontructions look like very good reflections of the portraits (as viewed in MS PowerPoint at 200%). The Grant Piper reconstruction looks better, though. Comparing the portraits, the selvedge in "Champion" is clearly green while in "Piper" it is red (it being born in mind that neither painting shows very good color preservation, quite aside from differential fading of the kilts). The setts, as shown in the portraits, are quite similar, but the dimensions of the sett seem a bit smaller in "Piper", and the red stripes are narrower in "Piper". And the sequence of stringing the warp must have differed to produce different selvedges.

In short, it was a new idea in 1704, nobody was being terribly careful to make an exact match, and there is NO connection whatever to later Grant tartans (save at the level of "red and green, broad springed".)

Will Pratt

[AckZel]

In short, all we really can tell from this statement is that the cheif of the clan wanted the men fighting under him to all be outfitted in similar colors when on the field. It was an early attempt to enforce some uniformity in military dress, and for that reason is important.

That's why hockey teams wear team uniforms. When in close range, swinging a claymore it is convenient to see your "team mates" easily before a slash, right? Wearing same colors is the best way to recognize the friends in fast battle situation. I don't think there is any actual "uniformity" reasons in that.

[Planopiper]

Ok, once again, a little knowledge is dangerous. I thought I'd read that highlanders discarded their plaids before battle, in which case having similar colored tartans would be no help at all in the fray. Who can save me the effort of actually looking up the documentation myself?