Books › A descriptive catalogue of the musical instruments recently exhibited at the Royal Military Exhibition, London, 1890 …, 1891 › scan 75
Scan 75
A descriptive catalogue of the musical instruments recently exhibited at the Royal Military Exhibition, London, 1890 …, 1891
8 lines. Read by computer on 1 October 2026. Printed page 55. See the scan on archive.org.
1use in Europe generally about the 16th century; Irish pipes blown thus were called Cuislean, or elbow pipes. Accurate information concerning the development of the Irish bagpipe is, however, exceedingly difficult to procure, but it seems that the instrument underwent gradual improvements until it eventually took the form of the Union pipes, or Irish bagpipe of the present day. The name of Union pipes probably originated from the instrument having appeared about the time of union of the Irish and English Parliaments.
3In Germany the bagpipe was known as Sackpfeiff, and Praetorius, who wrote in 1618 (Syntagma Musicum), describes minutely four or five different varieties, together with the respective compass and tuning of each. The largest bagpipe, he tells us, was called Bock, and was inflated by the mouth. The chanter had a compass of one octave from c to c'; the drone was tuned to C; in the Grosser Bock the drone was, however, a fourth lower, and sounded G. Another variety of bagpipe, called Schaffer-pfeiff, was smaller, but had two drones tuned to bb and f', and the chanter had a compass from f' to f''. Praetorius tells us that the notes given by the upper finger-holes upon the chanter of this instrument were of faulty intonation; the reason assigned being that there being no thumb-hole at the back, as in all the other bagpipes, faults of intonation could not be corrected. A smaller bagpipe, called Hümmelchen, possessed a compass extending from c'' to c''', and had two drones tuned to f' and c''. The smallest instrument of this kind was known as Dudey; its three drones were tuned to e'b, b'b, and e''b, and the compass of its chanter was from f'' to c'''.
5In Magdeburg and the immediate neighbourhood there was found another species of bagpipe, somewhat similar to the later Calabrian pipes, of which a fine specimen was exhibited in this collection. The Magdeburg pipes somewhat resembled the Schaffer-pfeiff, but sounded a third lower in tone. There were two chanters mounted in the same stock, that for the left hand giving the notes g, a, bb, c', d', and that for the right d', e', f', g', a'. This arrangement allowed of simple airs being performed in two parts.
7The application of the bellows to the bagpipe appears to have originated in Ireland, whence it was carried to France, where the instrument eventually took the form of the musette, and was further
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