Recent Irish kilt question

[O'Callaghan]

Until The Thing commented, I didn't really notice, but I have to take issue with just a couple of things.

What might be characterized as "the Highland Scots" did indeed come from Ireland-- the North East portion of the Island to be exact. The people inhabiting this least populous corner of Ireland were, in their own time, regarded as "different" than the other tribal people in Ireland, and it is thought that they may have been the remnant of the original inhabitants of the island, pushed back by successive waves of incoming people.

Be that as it may, the Scots came from a fairly defined and somewhat isolated group of people, not from the Irish population as a whole. They brought with them the traditions of that group of people, not an amalgam of traditions drawn from the length and breadth of the island. So, to suggest that had the course of Irish history been different the "Irish" would have evolved into a kilt wearing people is to make a leap of logic that is not wholly warranted.

The Gaels were at least the third wave of inhabitants of Ireland, after the Firbolgs and the Tuatha de Dannan, about whom very little is known, especially by me, LOL! However, the Dal Riada were one of the five major tribes of Irish Gaels, all of whom traditionally trace their lineages from Milesius (Milidh) who legend tells us came from Spain, and it is the Dal Riada that settled in the Scottish Highlands. That isn't to say that they mightn't have been mixed to some extent with earlier tribes that weren't Gaelic, but it is a long way from saying that they differed in any important way from the other four Irish Gaelic tribes.

It begs the question, "Why?"

And the only answer that can be given, or so it seems to me, is one of attempting to justify the present day fascination with kilts and tartans by the Irish diaspora. I think this is merely a manifestation of a desire to have a "national costume" where none exists. The simple reason for this is that the attire of the Irish people followed the natural evolution of European dress, as did all of the British Isles, save for one poor, tiny corner of Scotland. That the Highland kilt achieved its place as the "national costume" of Scotland is down solely to its having been romanticized throughout the whole of the 19th century, primarily due to the military exploits of a few Highland regiments. I am of the certain opinion that, if the Scottish regiments had been forced into trousers in 1770, the kilt, as we know it, would never have achieved anything like the prominence that it enjoys today.

That said, there is no reason whatsoever to make up excuses (or projections of quasi, what if, history) to justify wearing a kilt made up in an "Irish" tartan. If someone feels that the only way they can project a positive image of their Irish heritage and cultural traditions is by borrowing the Scottish kilt, that's fine by me. All I ask is that one refrains from trying to give their "Irish kilt" an historical or cultural pedigree that just isn't there.

Kilts, particularly non-tartan ones (and yes, I know the highlanders wore non-tartan ones as well), are about the only thing that has ever been proposed as Irish national dress, and this is not a recent proposal, but one that goes back more than a century, and yet which apparently still annoys the Scots even after all this time.