A few thoughts on choice and selection: tartan, clans, etc.

[MacLowlife]

Recent threads have got me thinking about choices. They say that hungry people seldom have trouble deciding- it is only people with leisure and relative comforts who find it difficult to make a decision. The level of prosperity most of us share would be staggering to the average highlander of 100 years ago, much less those of the time of the Vestiarum Scoticum. (I mean the time of its "discovery" not its allegedly antique authorship.) After all, we communicate throughout the world on devices- generally privately owned ones- that did not exist before about 1950 and would have cost the moon in 1975. And we alll (I think all) have central heating and indoor plumbing, not to mention cars, washing machines, motorcycles, etc.

And so we have the time to think about choices. While we do have more ancestors than our great great great grandfathers did, most of us can only think and talk about four or five generations- well under 100 people, many of whom come from the same tribe/clan/family and bear the same surname. But we worry about honoring as many as we can, or we pick and choose among them for reinforcement of our own ideas and preferences. I can trace my own ancestry back to the point where some of those ancestors' lines diverge and converge again, where cousins married cousins and at some levels, I see the same set of (great, great,,,) grandparents' names appearing more than once on the chart. I also live in a place where it is common for sons to bear the fathers' and maternal grandfathers' names, to the point that children grow up thinking McKenzie and Duncan and Stewart and Campbell are proper first names- and thought so before some character on the TV ( or in a strip club) turned up bearing them.

So I "get" the idea of wanting to refer to several generations of ancestry. But a name is a perfect example of how this selection process has been thought out before.

Let's just say John Campbell McDonald (named for his maternal Grandfather John Campbell, called Campbell) marries his distant cousin Flora McDonald Stuart Campbell.

Cam and Flora McDonald

She resists the urge to hyphenate her name and become Flora Campbell- McDonald. And so does he, because he would then be called Campbell McDonald-Campbell. But they have a son. He is named John Campbell McDonald, Jr. And then they have another one, who is named ...

Well, they can't quite decide. They toy with Florian, since they doubt they will have another child and Flora wants to honor her grandmother, whom she loved dearly. And then there is Old Uncle Ronnie McDonald, who made a lot of money in the restaurant business. They figure he might be generous to a great nephew who has his name. There is Campbell's boss, Mr. Duncan, who is like a father to Cam, having taken him into the doughnut business right out of college, and there are countless historic ancestors all about the family tree- J.E.B. Stuart, Colonel Archibald "Soupy" Campbell, hero of some long-forgotten battle, Cam's aging father Agricola McDonald - who is outstanding in his field. Nobody much remembers why, but his childhood friends call him "E.I." The list is endless. Flora lobbies hard for a couple of picturesque family names from long ago- Hunter and Dresser. Her college room mate, Frances Lowder MacLeod commiserates and mostly muddies the waters.

If I might digress a minute, there was a very silly Dick VanDyke show episode in which the Petries were facing this problem. Relatives had suggestions: Robert, Oscar, Sam, Edgar, BILL, Ulysses, David. And poor Rob Petrie gave up and named his child all of them- in acronym form- Rosebud.

But back now to Cam and Flora. They reason that many people do pretty well with just two names, while most manage nicely with three and a very few wander through life with four. Cam wants his son to be a normal kid, with a normal name. Before he was married, he had a dog and named him Spot. He remembers how he always envied the boy next door- Sandy Hatfield McCoy- who had a cool name like one of the boys on Flipper. Sandy.

How do they manage? Well, somehow they narrow it down to three names, including McDonald as the surname. They agree not to use either John or Campbell, since those names belong to Junior and they don't want him to have to share any more than he already does. As fond as she is of "E I", Flora can't imagine saddling a child with a name like Agricola, even as a middle name- it would be like naming your child Horatio or Milhous or Delano or something. She thinks briefly about Lowder Dresser McDonald, but Cam won't have it. what about Stuart Hunter? Agricola reminds them that his grandmother was Sioux and wonders if it would be OK to name him Sioux Hunter. Cam's thoughts turn to Johnny Cash and he puts his foot down.

I hate to tell you- I don't know what they named the boy. They moved away and we lost touch. Years later, I read where he became a football star and everybody called him Bubba. Because his older brother, like hundreds of thousands of older siblings before him, couldn't quite say "brother" at the age of four, but he was so pleased to have one and he called him Bubba.

We live in a time where nothing much seems irrevocable. If you have the money and the time, or sometimes just the energy, you can go back and fix all sorts of things. I honestly don't care what tartan another person wears. No, I really don't. If it is one of the three or four I can recognize, I may ask about it, but I am just as likely to get the name wrong and let the conversation start from there. I learned my colors before I learned most names, so I am probably more likely to go away remembering your kilt was red or green or blue. If you are wearing a sprig of Basil in your cap, I will spot it. If it is Rosemary or Poison Ivy, I might. After that, you are going to have to help me out. I am a frequent reader and contribuitor ( that's ONE name for it) to this forum. I wear a kilt several times a year. I imagine myself to be typically informed on these matters. If you think people are going to attack you over your choice of tartan, or over some other nicety, you might want to consider some means of defending yourself- like carrying a knife in your sock or playing the bagpipes- maybe wear shoes with extra-long laces, so that you can tie them up. Don't wear any underwear, just in case they try to pull yours down.

OK, I have gone on long enough. Here is my point: people are going to find a reason to do what they want to do. People who can't decide ought to try a little harder. If you still can't, save a little longer and get both. But hats and kilts are best worn one at a time. I am sorry if this sounds like I am picking on people or dodging the actual giving of advice to people who want and need it. I do not mean to pick on anybody and I am sure you will get plenty of good advice from others on this forum. The more I learn, the less sure I become.

But I still know what I like. Or I will when I see it.

[Ordway]

I am in full agreement with everything you wrote. Whatever you mean.

[Chas]

I am in full agreement with everything you wrote. Whatever you mean.

I fully agree with you, Ordway. And very succinctly put, I must say.

[rondo]

Thanks for the entertaining read, Mac.
Rondo

[OC Richard]

First the fascinating thought-provoking essay, then the hilarious replies! The best laugh I've had in a while.

On the topic of onomastics, I might point out that I, like many Catholics, have four names, my three 'original' names plus one Confirmation name.

Here in SoCal there is a large Mexican-American population and many of these people can effortlessly roll off their entire names, which are several names long, evidently incorporating the various female lines.

My direct male-line family, which came to the Virginia colony from England in 1762, maintained for many generations an interesting onomastic tradition, using the maiden names of women who married into the clan as first names of male children. Thus we have had, since the 18th century and throughout the 19th century, men named Pemberton Cook, Stuart Cook, Clay Cook, Green Cook, and so on. Had that tradition continued into recent generations my father would have been named Cooper Cook and I would have been named Stanley Cook, but alas! the system was abandoned in my immediate family.

The book Albion's Seed: Four British Folkways In America by David Hackett Fischer (which I highly recommend to anyone wishing to understand the cultural makeup of the United States) devotes a chapter to the 'naming ways' of each of the four mass migrations. He describes a naming tradition identical to the one long practiced in my family as being distinct to Virginia.

In the Delaware first names were rigidly perpetuated (the first-born male child received the first name of the mother's father, the second-born male child the first name of the father's father, the third-born male child received the first name of the father; the first-born female child the first name of the father's mother, and so forth. So, the same few first names were used again and again through the generations.

Back to tartans, I too have an embarrassment of riches as to all the various tartans I could choose were I not restricted to the direct male line:

Stuart
Cooper
Cornish National
Irish National
Cavan

not to mention American tartans such as

West Virginia
California

[TheOfficialBren]

I keep it nice and simple for my brain and my wallet.

Two kilts. One nice one (family tartan), one casual knock-about (universal tartan).

I don't feel the urge to build a private tartan library. Different strokes for different folks.

[Liam]

Well said, but good Lord man, it took you a mile or so to say it!

Slainte.....Bill

[Tobus]

I'm not sure I understood what you were trying to say. Maybe a longer, more detailed explanation would clear it up.

[MacMillans son]

Step away from the coffee pot MLL

[Nile]

I hear you, Mac. I was just pursuing a thread called "Family ties to multiple Clans". It wasn't up long before it was closed abruptly by the OP, but it provoked the same thoughts in me. I appreciate that you approached the situation delicately by using a well though out illustration.

I believe that there is a tendency to over think how we, in this modern world, intigrate with our clan heritage, especially in regards to how we might choose to honor our heritage. Clan society as it was in a medieval and emerging Scotland is nothing like it is today. And... the clans of today, world wide, are nothing like the past, even in Scotland.

Thank you for posting your thoughts.

Nile