Earliest use of brass-cantle sporrans?

[figheadair]

About old sporrans in museums, we must be aware that these tell us the what but not the when.

So besides that cantle Matt posted with a date on it, we're in the dark about the when of the brass cantle, at least from material evidence.

So we turn to old portraits. Unfortunately it's often difficult to tell whether the cantle is supposed to be leather or metal.

The portrait of James Moray by Jerimiah Davidson c1744 shows a grey sealskin sporran with matching flap.

I've never come acrosss sealskin sporrans until the mid-Cth19th at the eHaving seen the original portrait I have to disagree. The sporran

By the 1780s there are various paintings showing rectangular metal cantles. So where is there an 18th century portrait showing the semicircular brass cantle so often seen in museums?

There is a portrait of MacGregor of Glengyle c1750 that shows a fine curved brass cantled sporran.

One of the problems with earlier portraits is that often the waistcoat covers the top of the sporran so it's impossible to determine what the cantle is like.

[OC Richard]

I've never come acrosss sealskin sporrans until the mid-Cth19th at the eHaving seen the original portrait I have to disagree.

I think I've seen the original too... if it was at The National Portrait Gallery, or one of the castles... I can't recall. But in photos it's quite clear that it's sealskin. Nothing else looks remotely like mottled grey sealskin.

Anyhow here's an 18th century portrait which quite clearly shows sealskin, and I've seen the original many times, because it's here in Los Angeles! Yes the one in The National Museums Scotland is an unsigned copy, while the one in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) it the signed and dated original. (The copy is somewhat different, see the seperate thread "A Tale of Two Paintings".)

Here's the original, signed J. S. Copley 1780

[figheadair]

I think I've seen the original too... if it was at The National Portrait Gallery, or one of the castles... I can't recall. But in photos it's quite clear that it's sealskin. Nothing else looks remotely like mottled grey sealskin.

I still disagree. I doubt that you've seen the original as it's still in the family at Abercairney and has never, so far as I know, been shown. I will have to dig out the pictures that I took of it which I still believe show the sporran to be plain brown.

Anyhow here's an 18th century portrait which quite clearly shows sealskin, and I've seen the original many times, because it's here in Los Angeles! Yes the one in The National Portrait Gallery is an unsigned copy, while the one in the Los Angeles Museum of Art it the signed and dated original. The copy is somewhat different, the angle of the sword-arm was changed and the background altered. Here's the copy, in Scotland

Thanks for highlighting this portrait. I had no idea that there was a copy albeit with differences. My understanding is that the portrait is somewhat after the date that it portrays and was painted by Copley c1770. What date is on the original? The sporran is certainly fur and brass cantled but I'm not sure one can say with certainty that it's seal skin. It could equally be exotic cat of some sort.

It's a shame that it's not in better condition but the central figure in the Dutch Wall Mural looks as though it might have a mental cantle.

[OC Richard]

I The sporran is certainly fur and brass cantled but I'm not sure one can say with certainty that it's seal skin. It could equally be exotic cat of some sort.

Yes you're right there... I guess we need an expert on various furs to tell us just what Hugh Mongomerie's sporran is. I have seen sealskin sporrans that looked just like that, though, or at least they were being sold as sealskin.

BTW the cantle is silver, like the lace on his jacket and the rest of his accoutrements. The 77th Highlanders (Montgomerie's Highlanders) wore Dark Green facings and Silver lace, I am told.

I'm waiting for somebody to post an 18th century portrait of somebody wearing one of those semicircular brass cantle sporrans. I can't find one in any of my books.

[eckersley]

I think I've seen the original too... if it was at The National Portrait Gallery, or one of the castles... I can't recall. But in photos it's quite clear that it's sealskin. Nothing else looks remotely like mottled grey sealskin.

Anyhow here's an 18th century portrait which quite clearly shows sealskin, and I've seen the original many times, because it's here in Los Angeles! Yes the one in The National Museums Scotland is an unsigned copy, while the one in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) it the signed and dated original. (The copy is somewhat different, see the seperate thread "A Tale of Two Paintings".)

Here's the original, signed J. S. Copley 1780

[eckersley]

I think I've seen the original too... if it was at The National Portrait Gallery, or one of the castles... I can't recall. But in photos it's quite clear that it's sealskin. Nothing else looks remotely like mottled grey sealskin.

Anyhow here's an 18th century portrait which quite clearly shows sealskin, and I've seen the original many times, because it's here in Los Angeles! Yes the one in The National Museums Scotland is an unsigned copy, while the one in the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) it the signed and dated original. (The copy is somewhat different, see the seperate thread "A Tale of Two Paintings".)

Here's the original, signed J. S. Copley 1780

Albeit just slightly off topic, but as this original rarely sees the light of day, I would like to mention how wonderful it is to see so clearly the double thickness of his tartan in this, the original, portrait. With the exception of the MacIan miniatures, in most portraits where one could see, one sees the belted plaid is worn such that the fabric has clearly two selvages, as is the case here too and can be noticed on the wearer's left where the tartan is carried up over the shoulder. This doubling of the tartan fabric can be seen in the Piper for the Grants (to his right), the famous Lord Mungo (on the lowest edge of his kilt) and a number of others. Most people today seem to take a seven yard double-width piece of tartan and pleat the entire fabric until they have shortened it to a manageable length. However, from the paintings, this one being another example, and from personal experience, the seven or so yards appear to have been doubled back upon themselves to leave a length of only three-and-a-half yards or so of double-width cloth. This is then pleated in the usual way. This also supports the lack of the possibility to have a tie string to keep or re-do the pleats in the rear, as the tie string would need to be threaded though both thicknesses of the cloth. It seems to me that the plaid underwent such development as to remove the double-width aspect of it (I have not yet found paintings of belted plaids with seams indicating two lengths of single-width tartan sewn lengthwise together but came across a short length of Black Watch on sale in an antique shop in New York where that was the case), and that the lower "half" of the plaid, rather than being folded back upon itself as had been done, was pleated along its seven or more yard length, then ultimately to have its pleats sewn down. The double fringe on so many modern short kilts perhaps reflects this older belted plaid tradition of folding the tartan back upon itself to shorten the cloth to an actually manageable length of three-and-a-half yards.

d