Irish accoutrements

[OC Richard]

Thanks! It's cool that 40+ years of obsession about this stuff can be of use to somebody!

About Irish accoutrements, I saw this sporran on Ebay, which I think looks really cool, and you can't beat the price

http://www.ebay.com/itm/KILT-SPORRAN...cAAOSwD0lUkt7y

Here's the photo from the listing... I love the detail on that harp!



I think it's important to realise that traditional Goidelic costume was at one time a single stream, more or less, which existed both in Gaelic Scotland and in Ireland. The dress looked, as far as we know, the way it does in that illustration above. It consisted of a long shirt (often worn hitched up to the knee) usually dyed with saffron called leine, a short jacket called ionar, and a mantle (often called a rug or cloak by early observers) called brat, a colourful woven girdle crois, and moccasins pamputai.

But English incursions exterminated this traditional costume in Ireland. Only on the Aran islands did elements survive into modern times, the crios and the pamputai. It is thought that the brat evolved into a cloak in Ireland.

In the Highlands this ancient dress lived and thrived, however it became the fashion to wrap the mantle around the waist. This of course became the kilt in time. Heavy woolen socks (which aren't seen in ancient Irish dress AFAIK) became standard wear with this dress.

The late 19th century Irish Revivalists, seeking to return to their Goidelic roots, had to face the fact that traditional Irish costume had been extinct for several hundred years, so they looked to the old paintings. Seeing the skirtlike bottom of the saffron shirt they thought it a kilt by false analogy and incomplete understanding, and the Irish Saffron Kilt was born. It now has over a century of use.