Clan Heraldry: What you can and can't wear and display

[Lon Scot Reg Secretary]

Great link - Thanks.

The whole article should be made into a Word Document and made a sticky, so it can always be referred to and quoted.

I agree entirely, very sensible, well written and, most importantly, correct! With my Clan hat on, I have copied put this onto the Clan Young web site and the Clan Young FaceBook pages, and will also put it into The Clan Young International Gazette. We should make sure this information is spread as far and as wide as possible.

I hope to see as many of you as are coming to Bannockburn Live/The Gathering, I will be 'manning' the Clan Young Tent, so do pop in and say hello, always a warm welcome.

[Lon Scot Reg Secretary]

Apart from knives - brandishing them about, most of the article is rubbish.
I would like to see the writer try telling the 'Tartan Army' what, or what not, they can do/wear!
Visit any Scotland football/rugby/hockey match - whatever sport you can think of - and the crowd will be a sea of yellow lion rampart flags.
Most coats of arms have been around for nearly a thousand years. The original owners no longer exist. You will not be imprisoned for wearing a badge, or carrying a flag, with a coat of arms on it - whether it is your coat of arms or not. Most clan tartans, or so called clan tartans did not exist until 200 years ago. (200 years is not a long period of time for the British).
Most tartans are Victorian inventions and nearly all so called 'hunting tartans' are based on British government tartans - not Scottish. Whilst not acknowledged as the correct thing to do, anyone can wear any tartan. Full stop. - unless it belongs to the Royal Family or is copywrite - and only in Great Britain.
Dress code - black tie, white tie, casual, day sporran, etc., whatever, is American protocol, not acknowledged by the vast majority of kilt wearers in GB.
Visit Scotland, enjoy it, wear, do what you want - just dont flash your knives around.
. . . . . (and MacHugh is IRISH).

Oh dear, where do you start with this?

I think I'll just say that there IS dress protocol in the UK and Scotland, and just because Mr A Robertson hasn't come across it or doesn't agree with it is irrelevant. Would you were the same to a wedding as to a rugby match? Of course not.

Because football fans carry the wrong national flag doesn't make it correct or acceptable.

Wearing someone else's Crest or Arms is identity theft. Simple.

There are so many tartans that folk can wear, so apart from the obvious closed ones if you think it looks nice (and can justify it to the Tartan police should they ask)...., wear it!

Sgian Dhus can be worn at Bannockburn Live after the petition that we have all seen, but keep them in your hose top. Dirks, swords etc, leave on the wall or above your fireplace.

[O'Callaghan]

I don't want to be argumentative for the sake of argument, O'C, but the fact that the O'C armiger lives in Spain and speaks Spanish has no bearing on what is correct in Scotland, the OP's original question. A Coat of Arms acknowledged by Lord Lyon is the signature of an individual and may not, without consideration of fraud, be used by any other. In Scottish law it doesn't matter that you have been sold a bill of goods in Tibmuktu and that that you think you are entitled to his name and signature because of somebody else's commercial efforts: you are not.

There IS, in fact, a policeman for this misuse in Scotland. He is the Lord Lyon, and there is a somewhat similar entity in England, the College of Arms, and another in Eire, the Chief Herald. In those nations you may very well be -- and probably would be -- charged with fraud if you were to use what you consider your rightful or respectful 'coat of arms'.

One more thing: tanistry is alive and well in Scotland. That is our system of succession. Wherever did you get the idea it had been done away with?

I don't think the Chief Herald of Ireland will be after me for using my chief's coat of arms as an avatar here unless he gets a complaint from the armiger in Barcelona, and even then he is not going to have me extradited to Ireland to face trial. If there is a complaint from the chief, I will replace them with something else. I doubt if the Chief Herald would be sending the Gardai after me even if I lived in Cork.

As for tanistry, I stand corrected. Chief Conoghor O'Callaghan brought a court case in 1605 hoping to seize the lands of his clansmen, but that was not the outcome. He secured the chief's lands as his personal lands and eliminated tanistry in the succession to those lands, but the clansmen got to keep their lands. I think this suit was encouraged by suits in Scotland, in which the clansmen were treated as mere tenants and forced off the land, but I did not realise that tanistry survived in Scotland. The Scottish cases had no precedential value in Ireland, but hope springs eternal in the avaricious. Of course, all this was around 40 years before Cromwell exiled the chief's family to Clare.

[ThistleDown]

I can't speak for or to the system of tanistry in Ireland, O'C, but I can assure you that you are quite wrong when you connect tanistry and the 'clearances' in Scotland. There were many waves of emigration from the Highlands over 150 years, but those didn't even begin until 150 year after the date you use. Some emigration was people removing themselves from lands which could not support their rapidly increasing numbers, some were the result of cruelly-done evictions of tenants, some were folk wishing to better themselves and their children in 'new' lands, and some were due to famine only a bit less devastating than the one in Ireland. Nothing to do with our system of succession, just the history of a people in a poor land.

On the matter of use of heraldry belonging to someone else (and with tongue firmly planted in cheek), I have been thinking about having a cap badge made in the form below, and then sticking three or four bald eagle tail feathers in behind. I have been told this would be wrong and disrespectful -- and in fact illegal in the USA, but I doubt the FBI or somebody will seek my extradition.

[WVHighlander]

Cheeky, and I like it. I will take one of those cap badges if its in lead or pewter....

[Jock Scot]

I presume it would be alright if I wore that coat of arms in my bonnet and a handful of bald eagle tail feathers(not native to the UK, so I presume its legal?) around Inverness sometime, Rex?

Jock now puts his tongue back in its normal place.

[WVHighlander]

Jock,

Absolutely, you can also pin an oak leaf or rose for the plant badge if you like....

John

[ThistleDown]

I'll watch for you, Jock. Outside Grahams? You WILL stand out from the crowd.

Make sure there are four or more in the handful of feathers you stick in behind . That way there are no traditions being offended, even locally. Hmmmm, I don't know whether the Bald Eagle is classed as a protected species in Scotland, or not, since we don't have any in the wild. I should know that and will get back to you. It probably is because it's somebody's cultural symbol and we are pretty careful about offense in those matters. John suggests a rose; good idea. Make it a yellow one with oak leaf superimposed and then we will have all aspects covered. Move over, please

[Jock Scot]

Jock,

Absolutely, you can also pin an oak leaf or rose for the plant badge if you like....

John

Its always handy to at least know who I might upset, so in all seriousness, just what is the significance of the oak leaf ,or, rose? In some parts of the UK a white rose could well upset those in red rose country(Yorkshire v Lancashire), but in your part of the world? I know not, but how about , yellow rose = Texas? The oak leaf has me stumped.

[WVHighlander]

Jock, the Oak is the national tree and the red rose is the national flower of the USA.

Oak

http://www.statesymbolsusa.org/Natio...lTree-Oak.html

Rose

http://www.statesymbolsusa.org/Natio...al_flower.html