The present example is designated Huntly and Brodie in certain early collections, and, like those of Dunblane, Strathearn, and Atholl, it appears to belong to a district rather than to a family. Tradition shows it to have been in use during a considerable portion of last century by such families as Gordon, Brodie, and Forbes, or at least by members of these touched with Jacobitism, who appear to have assumed this tartan in common, just as many families of different name adopted a uniform wear in various localities. On the raising of the Gordon Highlanders in 1794 a yellow stripe was introduced into the Black Watch pattern for their regimental use; and since then the Gordons have discontinued the use of the Huntly except on full-dress occasions. In a beautiful painting of Miss Rebecca Forbes, daughter of Sir William Forbes of Pitsligo, married in 1802 to Alastair Ranaldson Macdonell, fifteenth of Glengarry, there is a dress of this tartan which is known to have been used by her family in Aberdeenshire. From information supplied by the late Dr. William Forbes Skene to Mr Elphinstone Dalrymple, it is ascertained that the present Forbes tartan was designed for the Pitsligo family in 1822 by another Miss Forbes of Pitsligo. It was done by merely adding a white line to the Forty-second; the Gordon was similarly obtained by the addition of a yellow one, and this is now the sole difference between the wear of the two principal families, Forbes and Gordon, who formerly wore the Huntly.
XI. HUNTLY