DC Dalgliesh

[OC Richard]

Last year, 2024, Britain had the smallest quantity of sheep than at any time in history, according to records.

I'm sure you're correct. As it happens the records go back to the De Pretiis or Edict on Prices of 301 AD, a failed attempt to slow down the rampant inflation happening in the Roman Empire.

The fact that British woollens find their way into this document shows that by the fourth century the industry had made its mark on the whole Empire.

Popular throughout the Empire was the birrus Britannicus, a semi-circular woollen cloak, and the tapete or tossia Britannica a woollen rug.

The spinning and weaving of wool had a long history in Britain, well established before the Romans. Sheep's wool was the most important fibre in Roman Britain. It is suggested that wool was possibly brought in from Scotland.

There was an extensive industry producing woollen goods in East Anglia. Complete garments were produced. From the late fourth century the Roman administration controlled weaving works and textile manufacture, under the procurator gynaecii in Britannis Ventensis.

Roman Britain by Patricia Southern

So we had British woollen garments being worn in North Africa, Judea, Dacia (Romania), Germany, Spain, everywhere Roman trade occurred.

[Troglodyte]

I'm sure you're correct. As it happens the records go back to the De Pretiis or Edict on Prices of 301 AD, a failed attempt to slow down the rampant inflation happening in the Roman Empire.

The fact that British woollens find their way into this document shows that by the fourth century the industry had made its mark on the whole Empire.

Popular throughout the Empire was the birrus Britannicus, a semi-circular woollen cloak, and the tapete or tossia Britannica a woollen rug.

The spinning and weaving of wool had a long history in Britain, well established before the Romans. Sheep's wool was the most important fibre in Roman Britain. It is suggested that wool was possibly brought in from Scotland.

There was an extensive industry producing woollen goods in East Anglia. Complete garments were produced. From the late fourth century the Roman administration controlled weaving works and textile manufacture, under the procurator gynaecii in Britannis Ventensis.

Roman Britain by Patricia Southern

So we had British woollen garments being worn in North Africa, Judea, Dacia (Romania), Germany, Spain, everywhere Roman trade occurred.

Despite all this history and tradition, the sad thing is that now there are no wool processors left in Scotland - native fleece has to be sent south into England to be processed into a usable yarn.

Some of it comes back ready to use, of course, but tartan weavers Strathmore Woollens of Forfar no longer produce cloth in Scotland. Marton Mills (who does not like their cloth?) is an entirely English operation (well, Yorkshire actually, and the folk in Yorkshire think there is no more to England that their county, and call everyone else 'foreigners') and is in the heart of some of the best wool-county in the UK, for both growing and processing.

Practical commercial economics is at the botom of the UK wool-trade demise, but most of what now goes on seems bizarre and illogical. But it makes sense to someone, somewhere.

[Adrian]

It is sad that D C Dalgliesh has gone into administration and has disappeared from the marketplace, the assets are in the process of being sold by the administrators. Not all is lost, I have managed to purchase the stock of yarn and the tartan samples - there's a 20ft shipping container that is now crammed. I'm in discussions with a Scottish contract weaver and continue to be in contact with the administrators. With a bit of luck some of these tartans will be produced again. Hopefully later this year will have managed a pilot weave of 6 tartans.

[OC Richard]

I have managed to purchase...the tartan samples - there's a 20ft shipping container that is now crammed.

I wonder if the piece of cloth dug up on the Culloden battlefield will be in there somewhere.

(Sorry to be a bit cheeky but in truth its whereabouts are a mystery.)

[Jock Scot]

I wonder if the piece of cloth dug up on the Culloden battlefield will be in there somewhere.

(Sorry to be a bit cheeky but in truth its whereabouts are a mystery.)

I wouldn't hold your breath.

[figheadair]

I wonder if the piece of cloth dug up on the Culloden battlefield will be in there somewhere.

(Sorry to be a bit cheeky but in truth its whereabouts are a mystery.)

That'll be because it never existed.

[RGM1]

It is sad that D C Dalgliesh has gone into administration and has disappeared from the marketplace, the assets are in the process of being sold by the administrators. Not all is lost, I have managed to purchase the stock of yarn and the tartan samples - there's a 20ft shipping container that is now crammed. I'm in discussions with a Scottish contract weaver and continue to be in contact with the administrators. With a bit of luck some of these tartans will be produced again. Hopefully later this year will have managed a pilot weave of 6 tartans.

Would be interested in enough Fleming tartan to make a fly if you happen to have some. Barbara Tewkesbury made me a beautiful 8 yard kilt out of material received two weeks before they closed up shop. I can provide picture if needed to identify.

[Adrian]

I've no rolls of tartan stock from D C Dalgliesh, there were 4 large boxes of offcuts, bags of pieces, scraps etc. It will be a while before I've sorted and Inventoried, All the stuff I have was sold to me via auctioneers Sweeney Kincaid as part of one of their monthly sales, there was only the 2 lots.

[OC Richard]

That'll be because it never existed.

Stranger things have happened! Who knows, it might turn up someday.

DC Dalgliesh did state that it was "on loan" through from whom isn't stated. Was the peat cutter who found it the owner? In England such dug finds are property of the Crown, no?

The conditions of the loan are stated, viz being insured for 2,000 pounds and locked in a safe each night, but the duration of the loan is not.

So the questions are
1) did the cloth fragment ever exist?
2) if it did, who was considered the owner?
3) if DC Dalgliesh had the fragment on loan, was it ever returned to the owner?
4) if it exists, where is it now?

The fragment was said to resemble a MacDonald tartan, though which of the several MacDonald tartans isn't stated.

[Troglodyte]

In England such dug finds are property of the Crown, no?

Not just England, the whole of the UK including Scotland.

But the law is for 'treasure' not everything or anything you might find, and is there to prevent people secretly digging up Saxon, Viking or Roman sites, finding 'treasure' in the form of gold and jewels and flogging it off on the black market. Think of the Sutton Hoo find or the bags of Roman gold coins that make the news.

When found items become the property of 'The Crown' by default, it is to put them into state guardianship or protection - the monarch, the government and the people have equal and joint responsibility and custodianship, but none has individual ownership. Being property of the Crown quite importantly protects it from a potentially greedy government.

Laws in the UK are usually the same across the United Kingdom, but the legal system allows for cultural or traditional differences locally - which is why a law might be named slightly differently and suffixed with 'England and Wales' or 'Scotland' accordingly and is restricted to that location. Despite common perception, Scotland has retained much of its pre-union independent identity in the form of laws, currency, public holidays etc.

The treasure-trove laws appear very sensible, in that they protect 'finds' of antiquities of national and historical importance and counter any finders-keepers claims. A centuries-old scrap of tartan in a peat-bog may have little commercial value, but it is priceless to historians - which, as Indiana Jones might rightly say, belongs in a museum.