The _Vestiarium Scoticum_, already acknowledged as the earliest and
the most elaborate illustrated publication on tartan designs, was
edited by the late John Sobieski Stuart from a MS. stated to belong
to the sixteenth century. The MS. was printed and published in 1842,
with plates executed from drawings by Charles Edward Stuart, the
editor’s brother. Of course the drawings are but a development of the
descriptions in the MS. It need scarcely be added that the volume is
now rare and costly. The MS. was transcribed and illuminated in 1829
by Sir Thomas Dick Lauder, for whom Charles Edward Stuart prepared a
series of drawings which included several tartans not illustrated in
the published work. One of these is here reproduced, and Sir Richard
Urquhart, Knycht, the reputed author of the MS., thus describes it:
“Mackeane hethe four stryppes of Blak upon ain scarlett feilde, and
upon the scarlett sett ain spraig (sprainge) of yellowe of saxteen
threidis, havand thereto ain bordure of Blak of twa threidis.” The
Mac Ians, whose name is variously spelt in the early clan rolls and
elsewhere as M’Kane, Mac Coin, Mac Eoin, Clanayioun, &c., were a branch
of the Clan Macdonald. That the use of the design was not confined to
this branch is evidenced by a contemporary portrait of Alastair Ruadh
of Glengarry (who was prominent in the ’45), in which he is depicted in
this tartan. The painting is in the possession of John Alastair Erskine
Cuninghame, Esq. of Balgownie, Perthshire, the last lineal descendant
and heir-general of Alastair Ronaldson Macdonell of Glengarry.
[Illustration: XXII. MAC KEANE]