National Dress, Gender and Scotland: 1745–1822

Abstract

This paper will investigate the relationship between national identity, dress and gender in Scotland. Two major events in Scottish history, the Jacobite rebellion of 1745 and the visit of George IV to Edinburgh in 1822, will be used as a foundation to demonstrate how the gendered approaches to national dress changed over the course of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. This will be done using Jules David Prown's basic methodology for the study of material culture. This involves description, deduction and speculation of surviving artefacts, in this case three garments housed at the National Museum of Scotland.