The tartan library
13 tartans, in alphabetical order. Open a record for its sources, what is known about its history and what is still unknown. Looking for a tartan by surname or place? Try the tartan finder.
Military tartan
The dark blue, green and black tartan of the 42nd Regiment of Foot, the Black Watch. The Scottish Register of Tartans lists it as Black Watch (Government), a military tartan, and says it is thought to have been designed in 1739.
Colours in the record: dark blue, green, black
UniversalEvidence level B
Clan tartan
The Scottish Register of Tartans lists Buchanan - 1850 as the clan tartan: a Wilsons of Bannockburn design, printed by W. and A. Smith in 1850 and authorised by the chief in 2022. The chief also recognised the different Vestiarium sett of 1842 that year.
Colours in the record: dark blue, green, black, red, white, yellow
No restriction recordedEvidence level A
Clan tartan
The Campbell clan tartan is the Black Watch sett in lighter shades. The Scottish Register of Tartans dates it to 1739 and says it became the Campbell tartan in the early 1800s. The Clan Campbell Society of North America says the present Duke of Argyll approves it and that the past seven chiefs disavowed the Campbell of Argyll sett.
Colours in the record: dark blue, green, black
No restriction recordedEvidence level C
Clan tartan
The Scottish Register of Tartans lists the accepted Douglas tartan as a Wilsons of Bannockburn sett of 1819 in green, blue and black with light blue and white lines. It was called Douglas Hunting by 1880. "Black Douglas" is a later design.
Colours in the record: black, light blue, green, dark blue, white
No restriction recordedEvidence level A
Clan tartan
A black and grey Douglas tartan that the Scottish Register of Tartans dates to 1842 and attributes to the Sobieski Stewarts' Vestiarium Scoticum, a work that the register says added spurious documentation.
Colours in the record: black, grey
No restriction recordedEvidence level A
Clan tartan
The Scottish Register of Tartans lists several Fraser clan setts: Fraser of Lovat (1893, from a printed book), Fraser (1800) by Wilsons of Bannockburn, and Fraser (1842) from the Vestiarium Scoticum. Colours given here are dark blue, red, green and white. No Register record shows a Fraser clan sett in use before 1745.
Colours in the record: dark blue, red, green, white
No restriction recordedEvidence level B
Clan tartan
The Gordon tartan is a blue, green and black sett with a single yellow stripe. The Scottish Register of Tartans says it was designed for the 92nd (Gordon) Highlanders on their raising in 1794 and later adopted as the clan tartan.
Colours in the record: dark blue, green, black, yellow
No restriction recordedEvidence level A
Clan tartan
The oldest of the Gordon Dress tartans in the Scottish Register of Tartans, first printed in W. and A.K. Johnston's The Tartans of the Clans and Septs of Scotland in 1906.
Colours in the record: dark blue, green, black, yellow
No restriction recordedEvidence level A
Clan tartan
The Scottish Register of Tartans dates the main MacDonald tartan to 1819 and calls it the oldest recorded version of the clan sett. It notes at least 27 versions across nine branches, and that MacDonald of the Isles (1842) comes from the Vestiarium Scoticum and is not generally regarded as a clan tartan.
Colours in the record: dark blue, green, red, black, white
No restriction recordedEvidence level A
Clan tartan
The Mackenzie clan tartan is a blue and green sett with red and white over-stripes, recorded in the Scottish Register of Tartans as the regimental tartan of the Seaforth Highlanders, raised by the Earl of Seaforth in 1778. The register lists twelve Mackenzie entries and none called Ancient or Modern.
Colours in the record: dark blue, black, green, white, red
No restriction recordedEvidence level A
Tartan
A red tartan with blue, black, yellow, white and green lines, listed in the Scottish Register of Tartans in the Royal category. It appears in Wilsons of Bannockburn records from about 1800 and is the personal tartan of the monarch.
Colours in the record: red, dark blue, black, yellow, white, green
UniversalEvidence level A
Clan tartan
The dress version of the Stewart tartan, with equal yellow and white stripes. The Scottish Register of Tartans estimates its date as about 1850 and links it to the Vestiarium Scoticum of 1842.
Colours in the record: red, dark blue, black, yellow, white, green
No restriction recordedEvidence level A
Clan tartan
The Scottish Register of Tartans records Wallace (SRT 1208) as a Clan/Family tartan dated 1800, in red, black and yellow, with no designer named. Nothing links any tartan to Sir William Wallace, who died in 1305: the oldest known tartan fragment dates from about 1500 onward.
Colours in the record: black, red, yellow
No restriction recordedEvidence level A
No tartan record matches those filters.
Image: Scottish Register of Tartans, rendered from the registered threadcount. Crown copyright, National Records of Scotland. Each record page links the image to its source, and the credits page lists them all.
Often compared
Each pair is two records that name one another as related. Why they are linked, and how they differ, is set out on the record pages.
How to read these pages
Named for a clan or family. The link between the name and the cloth is a claim with its own sources, and each record says how far back those sources go.
11 records in the library
Recorded for a regiment or another military unit. The record names the unit and the source that ties the sett to it.
1 record in the library
Named for a place, such as a town, a county or a region, and not for a family.
No record in the library yet
Designed for a weaver, a shop or a designer, with no clan or place attached to the name.
No record in the library yet
The type is a label for the name, not a rule about wearing. A record that fits none of the four is filed as "other", and its page gives the register's own category where the record holds one.