tartan1
/ˈtɑːt(ə)n
/noun
A woollen cloth woven in one of several patterns of coloured checks and intersecting lines, especially of a design associated with a particular Scottish clan: stripes and tartans have replaced floral chintzes [as modifier]: a tartan shortbread tin...
- The company directors of Beartas designed a new tartan, woven in Harris Tweed and called the ‘Isle of Harris Tartan’.
- If designing a new tartan will save the Scottish Socialist party from dying out completely, I'm willing to have a go.
- The revival of the house of Burberry is having an impact too as checks and colourful tartans abound on trousers and skirts.
adjective
Used allusively in reference to Scotland or the Scots: the financing proposals for the Scottish parliament amounted to a tartan tax...
- Scotland isn't just tartan fun and highland jinks, it's urban youth culture as well.
- The first is a negative tartan tax to incentivise business location in Scotland.
- This is partly because the much - maligned tartan tax has turned into a remarkably effective instrument of fiscal continence.
Origin
Late 15th century (originally Scots): perhaps from Old French tertaine, denoting a kind of cloth; compare with tartarin, a rich fabric formerly imported from the east through Tartary.
Rhymes
tartan2
/ˈtɑːt(ə)n/noun historical
A lateen-rigged, single-masted ship used in the Mediterranean.The tartan was a small vessel that navigated along the coast of the Mediterranean.
Origin
Early 17th century: from French tartane, from Italian tartana, perhaps from Arabic ṭarīda.