Need advice: run in with Kilt (feather?) Police

[thescot]

Solve the whole problem and wear peacock feathers, along with my peacock cloak....ith:

Or-r-r-r-r-r, . . . . maybe not!

[MacMillan of Rathdown]

An interesting note that few may be aware of is that the custom of wearing silver eagles' feathers cast as part of the crest-badge originated with the military to denote rank within various Scottish regiments, the highest ranking officers having three feathers and the lesser ranking ones having two or one. This can be seen on some of the older obsolete regimental bonnet badges worn during the Victorian period. Like so many other details of Highland dress, this affectation was adopted from the military by civilians in the latter part of the 19th century, just as the strap and buckle surround that bears the motto on clansmen's crests, modelled after the Order of the Garter insignia. This style was quite unknown prior to the Victorian era, as evidenced by portraits and actual crests from the Georgian period and earlier.

Without wishing to sound querulous, might I ask you for citations-- other than mere opinion-- for your statements concerning feathers cast as part of a regimental badge being indicative of military rank, and the basis for your contention that the strap and buckle devise used as a clansman's badge is based on the insignia of the Most Noble Order of the Garter?

[BEEDEE]

Folks - this thread was started in 2008 and has been dormant since Nov 2009! So I just have to bring out this old image:



Brian

[MacMillan of Rathdown]

Folks - this thread was started in 2008 and has been dormant since Nov 2009! So I just have to bring out this old image:



Brian

Fair play, but since this has now taken an interesting turn, perhaps the Mods would like to move it to a new location in Tartans and Heraldry beginning with post #82?

[greenman11]

The horse is not dead, he is merely resting. See, he just moved. Neigh I say, he will rise shortly.

[creagdhubh]

Well, I have read the entire thread and it's all very interesting. I went through my own little 'spiel' with members on XMTS a month ago with regards to the wearing of eagle feathers. I am a Scottish Armiger myself and certainly concur with Jock's, Matt's, Todd's, and MacMillan's replies to this topic. Well said gents!

Slainte mhath,

[Red Stag]

Without wishing to sound querulous, might I ask you for citations-- other than mere opinion-- for your statements concerning feathers cast as part of a regimental badge being indicative of military rank, and the basis for your contention that the strap and buckle devise used as a clansman's badge is based on the insignia of the Most Noble Order of the Garter?

The bit about the buckle and strap is mentioned in "So you're going to wear the kilt" revised 3rd edition by J. Charles Thompson, beginning on pg. 8. The chapter is a reprint of an article from 1973 and quotes some older books on the subject. Not knowing much of the history of it myself I'm finding it a little difficult to understand it on the first read through. It's late where I am and I'll have to re-read it tomorrow.

[Bigkahuna]

I forget the title of the book in which I saw them, having perused it in a public library some years ago, but it was in a work covering the insignia of various British military regiments that was compiled sometime in the late 19th century or the early years of the 20th century. The book was well illustrated and showed regimental cap badges with varying numbers of feathers according to the rank of the officer.

If you look at any portrait of a Highlander predating the Victorian era (including the many painted by R.R. MacIan, eight years into the good Queen's reign), you will not find one single instance of what we now consider to be a crest-badge with the garter type encirclement, as the concept of what we recognize as a crested cap-badge had yet to be invented as late as 1845.

It is only during the Victorian period that crests were worn encircled by the "strap and buckle" motif that is (or originally was) an exact duplication of the Garter insignia. Later on, the way the end of the strap is tucked into the knot at the base was changed so as to difference it from the Garter insignia:







Even in the Victorian era, when the custom of encircling crests with the strap and buckle device had taken hold, there was no real notion of armigers wearing their own crest within a plain circlet, and while eagle feather's were worn by armigers, chieftains and chiefs, they were the real thing rather than silver representations. As we can see from MacLeay's 1869 portrait of the chief of the Clan Chisholm, the Chief wears his own crest within the usual garter-type strap and buckle that we nowadays consider to be the mark of a clansman wearing the crest-badge of his chief:

I'm sorry but I must disagree. I have a copy of a bonnet badge of the 71St Regt. of Foot, Frasers Highlanders, from the American Revolution. It has a garter-style strap and buckle, Saltire Cross and Thistle, with the Regimental Motto around the border. To see it go to www.najecki.com.