National Tartan Day – U.S.
Today is a day to honor your Scottish ancestors—if you've got 'em!
Why April 6? The date goes back a loooong time, to April 6, 1320, when the “Scottish Declaration of Independence” was signed by Scottish nobility in Arbroath Abbey.
Why “tartan”? Tartan is a plaid pattern of criss-crossing horizontal and vertical stripes in various colors. Scottish kilts almost always have a tartan pattern. The pattern is not called “plaid” in Scotland; a plaid is a tartan cloth worn slung over the shoulder, or a tartan blanket. Different tartan patterns, with distinctive colors, used to be associated with the region of Scotland in which it was made, but since the mid-1800s, the different tartans came to be associated with different clans (families).
Find out more about Tartan Day here.
Find out more about tartans here.