tartane

Noun

tartan (countable and uncountable, plural tartans)

1. (uncountable) Woven woollen fabric with a distinctive pattern of coloured stripes intersecting at right angles originally associated with Scottish Highlanders, now with different clans (though this only dates from the late 18th century) and some Scottish families and institutions having their own patterns; (countable) a particular type of such fabric.
   • Her hands trembled […] as she adjusted the scarlet tartan screen or muffler made of plaid, which the Scottish women wore, much in the fashion of the black silk veils still a part of female dress in the Netherlands.1818 July 25, Jedediah Cleishbotham [pseudonym; Walter Scott], chapter II, in Tales of My Landlord, Second Series, […] (The Heart of Mid-Lothian), volume II, Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.]...

   Synonyms:

   plaid, Scotch plaid

   1. (countable) A pattern used on such fabric.
   2. (uncountable) Clothing made from this fabric.
      • Dovvn flovv'd her robe, a tartan ſheen, / Till half a leg vvas ſcrimply ſeen; […]1786, Robert Burns, “The Vision”, in Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish Dialect. […], 2nd edition, volume I, Edinburgh: […] T[homas] Cadell, […], and William Creech, […], published 1793, →OCLC, duan...
2. (countable, figuratively) An individual who wears tartan (etymology 1, noun sense 1.2); specifically, a Scottish Highlander, or a Scottish person (chiefly a Scotsman) in general.
3. (countable, figuratively) A type of fly used in fly fishing, often to catch salmon.
   • What is called the tartan-fly kills well in the Highlands at the clearing of the water. The tail must be yellow, mixed with a little red; and tipt with silver-thread; the body must be of five or six different colours, yellow, blue, orange, green, red, and black; the colours must join; […]1837, John Kirkbride, “Salmon-fishing”, in The Northern Angler; or, Fly-fisher’s Companion, Carlisle, Cumbria: C[harles] Thurnam; London: Edwards, […]; [Charles] Tilt, […], →OCLC, page 73
4. (UK, countable, figuratively) A young person who is a member of a Protestant gang in Northern Ireland.
   • The Shankill was a tough district all right. It was really hard-line Protestant and most of the kids were in tough Prod gangs, like the Tartans.1977, Peter Carter, chapter 3, in Under Goliath, London: Puffin Books in association with Oxford University Press, published 1980, →ISBN, page 15

See all 15 meanings of tartan