Wrapping the Braveheart kilt

[jhockin]

Re: the "Belted Plaid":
From: http://www.electricscotland.com/hist...dsketches5.htm

"... they love chiefly purple and blue; their predecessors used short mantles, or plaids of divers colours, sundrie ways divided, and among some the same custom is observed to this day; but, for the most part now, they are brown, most near to the colour of the hadder, to the effect when they lye among the hadders, the bright colour of their plaids shall not bewray them, with the which rather coloured than clad, they suffer the most cruel tempests that blow in the open fields, in such sort, that in a night of snow they sleep sound."

" The belted plaid, which was generally double, or in two folds, formed, when let down so as to envelop the whole person, a shelter from the storm, and a covering in which the wearer wrapt himself up in full security, when he lay down fearlessly among the heather. This, if benighted in his hunting excursions, or on a distant visit, he by no means considered it a hardship; nay, so little was he disturbed by the petty miseries which many feel from inclement weather, that, in storms of snow, frost, or wind, he would dip the plaid in water, and, wrapping himself up in it when moistened, lie down on the heath. The plaid thus swelled with moisture was supposed to resist the wind, so that the exhalation from the body."

.. Seems to me that he is saying that the cloth was folded in half (i.e.: fold the Length in half, then wrap in it. ). There is also a painting of a clan piper ( which I can't find right now) that seems to show two edges, at the edge of the over apron, which would support this idea.

(Found an image of the painting; grant piper - notice, on his right side, how a fold clearly shows the fabric doubled?)
image.jpg
.. Just saying ....