BAGPIPES in England and beyond
The Scottish Highland Bagpipe seems to dominate the world today, but it is merely the tip of an ancient evolutionary iceberg and only one bagpipe among many, both historically and geographically. LIST
Bagpipes probably originated in the Middle East and beyond over two thousand years ago (how?) and migrated north and west from the countries of the eastern Mediterranean during the Middle Ages, evolving and diversifying in the wake of the crusades. From the Caspian to the Atlantic, from Spain to Norway, Europe took up the bagpipe, so that today - and this surprises a lot of people - most European territories still have their own characteristic instrument and bagpipe music. LIST
From the fourteenth century even England had its own bagpipes of several kinds. They continued their northward journey during the sixteenth century until, by the early seventeenth, they had become established in Scotland, and so began a unique new music.
The Northumbrian smallpipes made it into modern times (by a revival whisker), but in the rest of England bagpipes died out, last heard in northern counties towards around 1800. That seems to have been the Union Bagpipe that the Scots and Irish also played for indoor music. It was the ancestor of the modern Uilleann Bagpipe of Ireland.
I have had a lot to say on the subjects of:
2-Chanter Bagpipes - Pipes & Pipers vs. Bagpipes & Bagpipers - Bagpipe History
SOME BAGPIPE LINKS
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