These (the auxiliaries from the isles) were afterwards mixed with the Irish militia, with the diversity of their arms, their armour, their mode, manners, and speech. The outward clothing they wore was a mottled garment with numerous colours hanging in folds to the calf of the leg, with a girdle round the loins over the garment. Some of them with horn-hafted swords, large and military, over their shoulders. A man when he had to strike with them was obliged to apply both his hands to the haft. Others with bows, well polished, strong and serviceable, with long twanging hempen strings, and sharp-pointed arrows that whizzed in their flight.[34]
The tartan belted plaid is undoubtedly here described, since no other garment could have been so disposed as to afford the requisite protection.
In 1596 Sir Duncan Campbell of Glenvrquhay granted in heritage to his third son,
John Campbell of Auchinryre, the lands of Auchynrere, Drumnavoke, and Condolych, respectively of the old extent of six, four, and two marks, for the yearly payment of £10 Scots at the usual terms, and one gallon of sufficient aquavite “et optimam chlamidem coloratam, vulgo ane fyne hewed brakane” [i.e., breacan or tartan plaid] at Martinmas.[35]
In connection with the plantation of Ulster by Scots colonists towards the end of the sixteenth century, there is evidence that tartan was manufactured in Ireland at that period. Concerning Lady Montgomery, wife of Sir Hugh Montgomery of the Eglinton family, who was a daughter of the Laird of Greenock, we read:—
She set up and encouraged linen and woollen manufactory which soon brought down the prices of the breakens [i.e., tartans] and narrow cloths of both sorts.[36]
Of seventeenth century writings one of the earliest to provide a notice of the Highland dress is Camden’s Britannia, printed in 1607, which mentions that:-
This country is inhabited by a rough, warlike, and very mischievous sort of people, commonly called Highlandmen, who are the true offspring of the ancient Scotch, speak Irish, call themselves Albinnich, are set and tight moulded, of great strength and swiftness, high spirited, bred up in war or rather robbery, and extremely prone to revenge and deep resentment. They wear after the Irish fashion striped mantles and thick long hair, and live by hunting, fishing, and plunder.[37]
Doubtless there was greater intercourse between the English and their conquered dependants in Ireland than between the English and the Scots, and hence the dress in Ireland ranks before that in Scotland in the comparison instituted by the writer.