I’m curious about this but not really able to find anything. The sources I’m finding online are saying that kilts are predominantly Scottish, they probably were adopted from Scotland by the Irish, they’re representative of Celtic identity (so also Welsh, Bretons, and Cornish), and can be found in other places, but not seeing much about an English kilt? Anytime I’m seeing Brits and kilts, they’re wearing highland kilts.
Apparently the word kilt is a Scots word (not to be confused with Scottish English) meaning to tuck clothes around the body.
A letter written by Ivan Baillie in 1768 and published in the Edinburgh Magazine in March 1785 states that the garment people would recognize as a kilt today was invented in the 1720s by Thomas Rawlinson, a Quaker from Lancashire. After the Jacobite campaign of 1715, the government opened the Highlands to outside exploitation, and Rawlinson went into partnership with Ian MacDonnell, chief of the MacDonnells of Glengarry, to manufacture charcoal from the forests near Inverness and smelt iron ore there. So the story goes, the belted plaid worn by the Highlanders he employed was too “cumbrous and unwieldy” for this work, so, together with the tailor of the regiment stationed at Inverness, Rawlinson produced a kilt which consisted of the lower half of the belted plaid worn as a “distinct garment with pleats already sewn”. He wore it himself, as did his business partner, whose clansmen then followed suit.
The link i provided has that as well, and it says that Rawlinson created the short kilt in Inverness, Scotland, with the help of local highlanders. Might have been a guy from Northwest England but he did it in Scotland with the Scots, and it’s an apparently dubious claim at that. The sources i provided also suggest that after the invention, the British army popularized the short kilt as opposed to the traditional long one, but it’s still of Scottish origin (not developed by the British army as the linked YouTube video suggests. Conflicting claims. I admittedly skimmed through the video to find the relevant part). Still interesting though.
“The design of the small kilt was adopted by the Highland regiment of the British Army, the military kilt then passed into civilian usage and has remained popular ever since”
This does, however, sound similar to claiming that Italy was the first non Scandinavian Western nation to find the new world because Christopher Columbus was from Italy, even though the whole excursion was wholly financed by, backed by, and launched from Spain.
There’s also dispute over the claim altogether from Scottish historians.
"Of course, many Scots dispute the notion that an Englishman invented the kilt. Indeed, there is some evidence to suggest that the kilt was in use before Rawlinson’s time. For example, the portrait of Kenneth Sutherland, 3rd Lord Duffus, appears to point to earlier use of the walking kilt. However, there are discrepancies concerning this theory among the Historiographical community, with some experts disagreeing as to the origins of the modern-day kilt.
Michael Fry, an eminent Scottish historian, debunked Lord Dacre’s claims about the kilt saying they ‘prove absolutely nothing’. Fry claims there is evidence that Tartan was worn in the Middle Ages—he also labelled Lord Dacre as ‘not a very reliable guide to Scottish history."
I’m curious about this but not really able to find anything. The sources I’m finding online are saying that kilts are predominantly Scottish, they probably were adopted from Scotland by the Irish, they’re representative of Celtic identity (so also Welsh, Bretons, and Cornish), and can be found in other places, but not seeing much about an English kilt? Anytime I’m seeing Brits and kilts, they’re wearing highland kilts.
Apparently the word kilt is a Scots word (not to be confused with Scottish English) meaning to tuck clothes around the body.
https://www.lochcarron.co.uk/our-journal/the-history-of-the-kilt/#:~:text=Originating in the traditional dress,cloth in a tartan pattern.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kilt
https://www.quora.com/Why-do-English-people-wear-kilts-My-English-granny-always-attended-formal-occasions-in-the-same-colored-patterned-kilt
A letter written by Ivan Baillie in 1768 and published in the Edinburgh Magazine in March 1785 states that the garment people would recognize as a kilt today was invented in the 1720s by Thomas Rawlinson, a Quaker from Lancashire. After the Jacobite campaign of 1715, the government opened the Highlands to outside exploitation, and Rawlinson went into partnership with Ian MacDonnell, chief of the MacDonnells of Glengarry, to manufacture charcoal from the forests near Inverness and smelt iron ore there. So the story goes, the belted plaid worn by the Highlanders he employed was too “cumbrous and unwieldy” for this work, so, together with the tailor of the regiment stationed at Inverness, Rawlinson produced a kilt which consisted of the lower half of the belted plaid worn as a “distinct garment with pleats already sewn”. He wore it himself, as did his business partner, whose clansmen then followed suit.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_kilt#:~:text=The belted plaid (breacan%20an,worn%20by%20the%20Gaelic%20Irish.
Video on how the modern kilt was developed in the British army
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPLKLVvX_L4
The link i provided has that as well, and it says that Rawlinson created the short kilt in Inverness, Scotland, with the help of local highlanders. Might have been a guy from Northwest England but he did it in Scotland with the Scots, and it’s an apparently dubious claim at that. The sources i provided also suggest that after the invention, the British army popularized the short kilt as opposed to the traditional long one, but it’s still of Scottish origin (not developed by the British army as the linked YouTube video suggests. Conflicting claims. I admittedly skimmed through the video to find the relevant part). Still interesting though.
“The design of the small kilt was adopted by the Highland regiment of the British Army, the military kilt then passed into civilian usage and has remained popular ever since”
This does, however, sound similar to claiming that Italy was the first non Scandinavian Western nation to find the new world because Christopher Columbus was from Italy, even though the whole excursion was wholly financed by, backed by, and launched from Spain.
There’s also dispute over the claim altogether from Scottish historians.
"Of course, many Scots dispute the notion that an Englishman invented the kilt. Indeed, there is some evidence to suggest that the kilt was in use before Rawlinson’s time. For example, the portrait of Kenneth Sutherland, 3rd Lord Duffus, appears to point to earlier use of the walking kilt. However, there are discrepancies concerning this theory among the Historiographical community, with some experts disagreeing as to the origins of the modern-day kilt.
Michael Fry, an eminent Scottish historian, debunked Lord Dacre’s claims about the kilt saying they ‘prove absolutely nothing’. Fry claims there is evidence that Tartan was worn in the Middle Ages—he also labelled Lord Dacre as ‘not a very reliable guide to Scottish history."
https://www.lochcarron.co.uk/our-journal/the-history-of-the-kilt/#:~:text=Originating in the traditional dress,cloth in a tartan pattern