macrimmon

Updated: May 8, 2025

There has been in Sky, beyond all time of memory, a college of pipers, under the direction of Macrimmon, which is not quite extinct. There was another in Mull, superintended by Rankin, which expired about sixteen years ago. To these colleges, while the pipe retained its honour, the students of musick repaired for education.

Samuel Johnson - Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland

Here will be a braw chance to settle it." "Why, sir," said Alan, still addressing Robin, from whom, indeed, he had not so much as shifted his eyes, nor yet Robin from him, "why, sir," says Alan, "I think I will have heard some sough of the sort. Have ye music, as folk say? Are ye a bit of a piper?" "I can pipe like a Macrimmon!" cries Robin. "And that is a very bold word," quoth Alan.

Robert Louis Stevenson - The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. 10

I was once so hard put at by my Great enemy, as I may well ca' him, that I was forced e'en to gie way to the tide, and removed myself and my people and family from our dwellings in our native land, and to withdraw for a time into MacCallum More's country and Helen made a Lament on our departure, as weel as MacRimmon* himsell could hae framed it and so piteously sad and waesome, that our hearts amaist broke as we sate and listened to her it was like the wailing of one that mourns for the mother that bore him the tears came down the rough faces of our gillies as they hearkened; and I wad not have the same touch of heartbreak again, no, not to have all the lands that ever were owned by MacGregor."

Sir Walter Scott - Rob Roy — Volume 02

The 'Rout of Moy' was hardly more creditable to the Hanoverian arms than the 'Canter of Coltbridge. In this affair only one man fall, MacRimmon, the hereditary piper of the Macleods. Before leaving Skye he had prophesied his own death in the lament, 'Macleod shall return, but MacRimmon shall never.

- The Red True Story Book

I was once so hard put at by my Great enemy, as I may well ca' him, that I was forced e'en to gie way to the tide, and removed myself and my people and family from our dwellings in our native land, and to withdraw for a time into MacCallum More's country and Helen made a Lament on our departure, as weel as MacRimmon* himsell could hae framed it and so piteously sad and waesome, that our hearts amaist broke as we sate and listened to her it was like the wailing of one that mourns for the mother that bore him the tears came down the rough faces of our gillies as they hearkened; and I wad not have the same touch of heartbreak again, no, not to have all the lands that ever were owned by MacGregor."

Sir Walter Scott - Rob Roy — Complete

The solace which the bagpipe can give, they have long enjoyed; but among other changes, which the last Revolution introduced, the use of the bagpipe begins to be forgotten. Some of the chief families still entertain a piper, whose office was anciently hereditary. Macrimmon was piper to Macleod, and Rankin to Maclean of Col. The tunes of the bagpipe are traditional.

Samuel Johnson - Journey to the Western Islands of Scotland

Here will be a braw chance to settle it." "Why, sir," said Alan, still addressing Robin, from whom indeed he had not so much as shifted his eyes, nor yet Robin from him, "why, sir," says Alan, "I think I will have heard some sough* of the sort. Have ye music, as folk say? Are ye a bit of a piper?" * Rumour. "I can pipe like a Macrimmon!" cries Robin. "And that is a very bold word," quoth Alan.

Robert Louis Stevenson - Kidnapped