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Tartan patterns have been used in Scottish weaving for centuries. A possible predecessor dating from the 3rd century found near the Antonine Wall and known as the " Falkirk sett" has a checked pattern in two colours identified as the undyed brown and white of the native Soay sheep. The fabric had been used as a stopper in an earthenware pot containing a hoard of silver coins.
For many centuries, the patterns were loosely associated with the weavers of a particular area, though it was common for highlanders to wear a number of different tartans at the same time. A 1587 charter granted to Hector Maclean of Duart requires feu duty on land paid as 60 ells of cloth of white, black and green colours. A witness of the 1689 Battle of Killiecrankie describes " McDonnell's men in their triple stripes". From 1725 the government force of the Highland Independent Companies introduced a standardised tartan chosen to avoid association with any particular clan and this was formalised when they became the Black Watch regiment in 1739.
The most effective fighters for Jacobitism were the supporting Scottish clans, leading to an association of tartans with the Jacobite cause. Efforts to pacify the Highlands led to the 1746Events January 8 Bonnie Prince Charlie occupies Stirling April 16 Battle of Culloden brings an end to the Jacobite Risings October 22 The College of New Jersey is founded (it becomes Princeton University in 1896) October 28 An earthquake demolishes Lima a Dress ActThe Dress Act was part of the Act of Proscription which came into force on August 1st, 1746 and made wearing the Highland Dress including tartan or a kilt illegal in Scotland as well as reiterating the Disarming Act. The Jacobite Risings between 1689 and banning tartans with exemptions for the military and the gentry. Soon after the Act was repealed in 1782Events January 7 The first American commercial bank opens ( Bank of North America). January 15 Superintendent of Finance Robert Morris goes before the United States Congress to recommend establishment of a national mint and decimal coinage February 5 Span Highland Societies of landowners were promoting "the general use of the ancient Highland dress". William Wilson & Sons of BannockburnBannockburn is a village immediately south of the city of Stirling in Scotland. It is named after the Bannock Burn, a stream running through the village before flowing into the River Forth. Burn is the scots word for a stream. Marshy land surrounding the became the foremost weaving manufacturer around 1770Events March 5 Boston Massacre: 5 Americans killed by British troops in an event that would help start the American Revolutionary War 5 years later. May 14 Marie Antoinette arrives to French Court. May 16 14-year old Marie Antoinette marries 15-year old L as suppliers of tartan to the military. Wilson corresponded with his agents in the highlands to get information and samples of cloth from the clan districts to enable him to reproduce "perfectly genuine patterns" and recorded over 200 setts by 1822Events March 30 Florida becomes a United States territory. May 24 Battle of Pichincha: Simon Bolivar secures the independence of Quito. June 14 Charles Babbage proposes a Difference engine in a paper to the Royal Astronomical Society entitled "Note on the, many of which were tentatively named. The Cockburn Collection of named samples made by Wilsons was put together between 1810Events January 10 Marriage of Napoleon and Josephine is annulled January 20 Tyrolean rebel leader Andreas Hofer executed March 11 Napoleon marries Marie-Louise of Austria April 19 Venezuela achieves home rule: Emparan, Governor of the Captaincy General is and 1820Events January 1 Constitutionalist military insurrection at Cadiz leads to summoning of Spanish parliament ( March 7) and restoration of 1812 Constitution ( March 8) by king Ferdinand VII. January 29 George the Prince Regent becomes king George IV of the and is now in the Mitchell Library in Glasgow. At this time many setts were simply numbered, or given fanciful names such as the " Robin Hood" tartan.
By the 19th century the Highland romantic revival inspired by James Macpherson's Ossian poems and the writings of Walter Scott led to wider interest, with clubs like the Celtic Society of Edinburgh welcoming Lowlanders. The pageantry invented for the 1822 visit of King George IV to Scotland brought a sudden demand for tartan cloth and made it the national dress of the whole of Scotland, with the invention of many new clan tartans to suit.