What level of dress would you classify this?

[Jock Scot]

Tobus.

In those days most Highlanders went barefoot so hose and sporrans were not likely to be much of a concern, in fact they were so poor that they probably did not even know they existed! Why are there no pictures?Well the true highlander would not be much of a sale pitch for the romantic sales dream of an astute artist, with his subject dressed in rags, now would he? Sorry you are really barking up the wrong tree here.

[BobsYourUncle]

Tobus.

In those days most Highlanders went barefoot so hose and sporrans were not likely to be much of a concern, in fact they were so poor that they probably did not even know they existed! Why are there no pictures?Well the true highlander would not be much of a sale pitch for the romantic sales dream of an astute artist, with his subject dressed in rags, now would he? Sorry you are really barking up the wrong tree here.

However, Jock I must agree with Tobus and disagree with you somewhat here. You, Jock are correct that most highlanders in the period we are talking about were shockingly poor, did not have either shoes or hose at all, much less sets of plain and argyll to choose from. However, Tobus is correct that those who did possess the means are portrayed contemporaneously as wearing both long hair sporrans and argyll hose as daywear.

Jock, where I disagree with your statements centers around your assertion that the paintings and portraiture are wholly unreliable as evidence of period clothing. Paintings and portraiture will never be evidence of what crofters routinely wore, or what folks living subsistence existences wore--as you say, they wore rags if they had anything at all. Yet for those who had the means, and who appeared for portraits, paintings and photographs, it would be inaccurate to insist that there was no truth or evidence to be had from those, as to what people of some means were wearing.

While Kenneth Macleay's watercolors were commissioned in the course of the Victorian era in which much fraudulent romanticising took place of the Highlands and Highland clothing, not all contemporary photos or portraiture was fraudulent. In too many threads on this forum, Kenneth MacLeay's work has been lumped in with the fraudsters, without credit being given for any accuracy whatsoever. Those who off handedly dismiss the accuracy of MacLeay's work would do well to actually read the description of how his work was done, and the carefully recorded information that goes along with each portrait in more recent additions of "The Highlanders of Scotland". While it would be inaccurate to conclude that what is represented therein was what every man jack of them was wearing in Scotland, it is equally wrong to say that what is shown is fraudulent.

MacLeay began his work in 1865, with the portraits of the workers on the Balmoral estate. During the next several years, after a delay caused by illness in 1866, he traveled to Dunkeld to paint the Atholemen in February 1867, that summer he was in Perthshire painting Menzies, Stewarts, etc; by October 1867, he had finished two Campbell portraits and gone on to Badenoch to paint MacPhersons, and so on. See The Highlanders of Scotland, The Complete Watercolours Commissioned by Queen Victoria from Kenneth MacLeay of her Scottish Retainers and Clansmen, (c) HM The Queen, 1986, Hagerston Press, London, pp. 10-15.

MacLeay went "into the field" to paint actual men where they lived. I have no doubt that these men presented themselves in their best finery, and doubt very much that they dressed in this fashion on a daily basis, BUT it was their own clothes, not clothes fancifully imagined by MacLeay, or costumes they were asked to wear by the Queen. In the right circumstances, for certain functions, these are the clothes that they wore.

Here is an example from the above cited work in furtherance of my point:

This is a contemporary photo of Wille Duff,



Highlanders, p. 13

Here is how MacLeay rendered him in portrait:



Highlanders, MacLeay # 10

While MacLeay cleaned him up a bit, he was quite accurate in his depiction. Mr. Duff does not appear to be at all wealthy, and does not appear to have been dressed in a fraudulent Brigadoon costume by anyone.

It is time for MacLeay's work to be accorded the level of accuracy it deserves. Not everyone could dress the way the people in MacLeay's work did, but some actually could and sometimes did dress that way. MacLeay's work can provide an accurate guide as to dress of the day, so long as Jock's qualifiers are appropriately applied.

So endeth the sermon. Cheers!

[Tobus]

Tobus.

In those days most Highlanders went barefoot so hose and sporrans were not likely to be much of a concern, in fact they were so poor that they probably did not even know they existed! Why are there no pictures?Well the true highlander would not be much of a sale pitch for the romantic sales dream of an astute artist, with his subject dressed in rags, now would he? Sorry you are really barking up the wrong tree here.

...

So apart from estate staff being kitted out by their wealthy employers and in Cahoots with romantic artists with commercial romantic ideas, the life and attire of the common Highlander was nothing like the life and attire of those portrayed posing in the pictures.

Well, I suppose if that's the case (which I have no doubt that it is), then none of us are being at all accurate in wearing a kilt to represent what "most Highlanders" wore. Otherwise we'd all wear rags and run about barefoot at our local Highland Games. It's important to note, though, that all our modern conventions of kilt-wearing are handed down not from the poorest of peasants or the "common Highlander", but from the men who did wear shoes and hose, sporrans and jackets, etc.

And those who did, even if they were being "kitted out by their wealthy employers" or wearing their old military kit, seem to have worn what BobsYourUncle described below. At least for one part of Scotland's history, anyway. Would you not agree?

This has been an excellent discussion, and I appreciate everyone's input thus far. I suppose the relevant questions here are:

(1) Whether hair sporrans and tartan/diced hose have any historical basis as daywear, or whether they were fictional romantic figments of one person's imagination. It seems to me that the evidence does suggest that some men, though they may be high in station compared to the general public-at-large, did indeed wear such attire during the day.

(2) Did they wear it while fishing, hunting, and other common daily 'dirty' activities? I don't know. Does it matter? Obviously when I'm wearing the outfit shown in my original post, I'm not about to shoot a deer or net a fish. Even if the historic Highlanders portrayed in MacLeay's works only wore them for nice occasions like having a portrait done, how is it historically inaccurate for me to do the same - i.e. wearing them for nice occasions like a wedding or party?

(3) Isn't kilt-wearing in general based on a bit of "romanticism" anyway?

I actually like this look. Yes, as Jock has pointed out, it is more than likely what one would have seen at Balmoral rather than else where in 19th century Scotland (look at the photos of John Brown for a comparison). But it does have a formality that I think looks rather nice, especially compared to a lot of the (slovenly?) informal attire one sees to today.

Where would I wear it? Well, it is rather somber, so definitely to funerals and to weddings of less-than-favored nieces. Dinners at my club, meetings with my banker, and pretty much any where else where I had to present a no-nonsense appearance.

Like I said, I like it. I think the outfit looks good. It's eccentric in a very personal way, which in my mind is a good thing-- I think it can best be summed up with the word "style", which is different than stylish.

Thank you. That was an interesting way of putting it: "style" versus "stylish". There's a huge gap between the two. As "stylish" or "in-style" seems to change from year to year, decade to decade (witness the new fashion of 'black-out' and ruche ties), one needn't necessarily worry about being in-style to be stylish. This look may be slightly eccentric amonst traditionalists, but I think it's an excellent look.

I find it curious that you described it as "somber", which I take as gloomy or depressing. If I may ask, what is it about the outfit that makes it somber to you? And how would you recommend livening it up?

The main theme I see from the excellent responses in this thread is that if I were to wear this outfit to a traditional Scottish event, I should go with plain hose and a daywear sporran. Those points are well taken. I can certainly switch over to plain hose easily enough. I don't have a plain 'daywear' sporran, though.