Posted on 04/19/2008 7:19:17 AM PDT by blam
Highland bagpipe is a recent invention for nostalgic Scotish émigrés, expert claims
By Patrick Sawer
Last Updated: 9:34am BST 19/04/2008
Whisper it if you dare, but the age-old Highland bagpipe - beloved of sentimental Scots and American tourists in search of their Highland roots - is in fact a recent invention.
Queen Victoria appointed a 'personal piper to the sovereign'
A controversial new study has claimed that far from being the time-honoured instrument which led the clans into battle against the Auld Enemy, the bagpipe as we know it was developed in the early 1800s.
It now seems that, like the kilt and most tartans, the tradition of the great Highland bagpipe was something manufactured for the benefit of nostalgic Scottish émigrés.
According to Hugh Cheape, a leading Gaelic historian and expert piper: “The written and received history of the great Highland bagpipe reflects in many of its parts the triumph of sentiment over fact ... an orthodoxy has emerged from surprisingly modest origins in the first half of the 19th century and it was elaborated by repetition, speculation and guesswork in the second.”
He added: “We have to admit that the great Highland bagpipe that we now know was part of this invention of tradition.”
In a new book, to be published by the National Museums of Scotland, Mr Cheape claims the Highland bagpipe was never used to lead the Scots clans into battle against the English, nor was it used to play laments to fallen chieftains.
Instead he argues that two well-established pipe makers in Edinburgh - Hugh Robertson and Donald MacDonald - created the instrument now known as the Great Highland Bagpipe in the early 1800s.
What’s more, many of the Highland bagpipes linked to great events in Scottish history are in fact fake.
One set allegedly played at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815 in fact comes from three or four pipes, including 20th century parts, and Mr Cheape cast similar doubts over pipes allegedly played at the battles of Culloden in 1745 and at Flodden in 1513.
“The bagpipe in Scotland has suffered a malaise of misunderstanding and misinterpretation, of misappropriation and manipulation of a lively and vital musical culture. Its treatment might even serve as a metaphor for Scottish history and culture since the 18th century,” he writes.
However, though the Highland bagpipe may be a phoney, there is a genuine tradition of piping in Scotland.
A simpler type of pipe, which has its roots in the Islamic world, the Mediterranean and eastern Europe, was popular throughout the Highlands until the defeat of the Jacobite rebellion at the battle of Culloden in 1745.
Until then clan chiefs had been patrons of piping and pipe music, sponsoring musicians who founded their own piping colleges.
Mr Cheape argues that following the defeat of Bonnie Prince Charlie and his men, educated and wealthy expatriate Scots living in London tried to keep the flame of nationhood burning and in 1778 founded the Highland Society of London with the aim of “preserving the martial spirits, language, dress, music and antiquities of the ancient Caledonians”.
The society set up piping competitions and commissioned pipes as prizes from Robertson and MacDonald, whose instruments were used in annual pageants of Highland culture at the Theatre Royal in Edinburgh.
It was these events which helped create the character of the “stage Highlander”.
Queen Victoria gave her seal of approval to the craze for all things Scottish when she appointed a “personal piper to the sovereign” in 1843, charged with playing under her window every weekday at 9am when she was in residence at Buckingham Palace, Windsor Castle, Holyrood or Balmoral.
Mr Cheape, a former curator with the National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh and now with the University of the Highland and Islands, is calling for a new national collection of bagpipes and further research into the true origins and history of piping in Scotland.
The first documented bagpipe dates to a 1,000BC Hittite carving from modern Turkey.
The instrument spread through the near east, Europe and the Mediterranean to become a traditional folk instrument in dozens of countries.
Other bagpipes played in the British Isles include the Irish uilleann pipes, and the Northumbrian, Border and Leicestershire small pipes.
"Mr Cheape argues that following the defeat of Bonnie Prince Charlie and his men, educated and wealthy expatriate Scots living in London tried to keep the flame of nationhood burning and in 1778 founded the Highland Society of London with the aim of “preserving the martial spirits, language, dress, music and antiquities of the ancient Caledonians”
Many of the Scots who were fighting with Bonnie Prince Charles were forced to leave Scotland...many settled in North Carolina and began harvesting rosen/pitch from the native pine trees that would be used in ship repair.
The term 'Tar Heels' can be traced to these early Scots.
At one time, North Carolina was world renowned for ship repair quality and ship building expertise. (Wooden ships)
The Northumbrian pipes have a similar background. In the early 19th century, skilled makers turned a primitive folk instrument into a sophisticated little pipe.
The reasons for this is pretty obvious. Primitive shepherds and clansman didn’t have the money to commission such fancy instruments, and modern steel tools and machinery are needed to make really good ones.
I don’t think we have a Northumbrian pipe ping list here.
“A simpler type of pipe, which has its roots in the Islamic world, the Mediterranean and eastern Europe, was popular throughout the Highlands until the defeat of the Jacobite rebellion at the battle of Culloden in 1745.”
Need I say more?
Scotland ping
I learned of a group of direct descendants of these Scots living in a remote part of North Carolina (said to still be speaking “Elizabethan English”, among other things). At one point the British had confiscated all their bagpipes as the music was thought to foment rebellion.
In a small church in the mountains the congregation substituted their own voices: men as the drone pipes and the women as the chanter. I actually heard on NPR this group singing (playing?) “Amazing Grace”. No words, just human sounds evoking the lost bagpipes.
The sound was unique, to say the least.
It is said that Robert the Bruce marched to the Battle of Bannockbum in 1314 with his troops playing the pipes. The Irish have stone carvings dating back to the 12th century depicting the pipes.
The article acknowledges that pre-1745 Highlanders played the pipes and that chiefs actually founded colleges of piping. AND that there were "well-established pipe makers in Edinburgh." What were they making? Oboes?
And the British went to the trouble to ban the pipes after Culloden as "instruments of war" -
All that went on was the usual Victorian technical improvements which occurred in everything else around that time. Of course you had the hiatus while the pipes were banned, and things were bound to change a little, but I see this as much ado about nothing much.
A bagpipe player with a pager......
Wouldn't that be a screech-howl-squawk list?
This article is full of wind.
Sounds like a grant student looking for sensationalism, so instead of picking a fight w the muslims he’d going after the Scots.
Historical accuracy isn't exactly Mel Gibson's strong suit. ;)
"That'sall crop."
Er, no. The Northumbrian pipe has a tonality similar to a clarinet.
Yep, this is merely iconoclastic journalism. Consider the source here.
3 versions of the origin of 'tarheel' from UNC.
I hardly think any version of the term “tar heel” published by UNC is likely to be objective or factual, especially if the version is unflattering.
“Historical accuracy isn’t exactly Mel Gibson’s strong suit. ;)”
So what?
It was a fun movie.
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