They have been played across the globe for hundreds of years, with variations in Ireland, the Caucasus, Brittany and North Africa.
Mentioned in the Canterbury Tales, some say the earliest bagpipes date back to Roman times and before.
But without doing down the claims of the Northumbrian smallpipes or Ireland's haunting uilleann pipes, bagpipes have become indelibly associated with Scotland in the public imagination.
That is why Glasgow is home to Piping Live! the world's biggest celebration of the instrument with the love-them-or-hate-them reputation.
With an explicit desire to capitalise on the city's post-Commonwealth Games glow, event organisers are expecting about 50,000 fans and 8,000 musicians to visit the city for a blend of the traditional, modern and surprising. With players expected from 26 countries, the welcome for audiences and musicians alike is sure to be every bit as warm as that for the sporting heroes who departed barely a week ago.
And with the event incorporating food for the first time this year, there's every reason to think it won't just be the music that is piping hot.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article