Primary Sources
DOW Lord Breadalban’s march / Boddich na mbrigs DOW.30: 32
C0 Earl of Breadalbins Gathering C0
C1 Lord Breadalbin’s Gathering C1.19: 44
D1 Bodaich na’m Brigis / Lord Breadalbane’s March D1.21: 102
KB Bodaich na’m Brigais / The Carles with the Breeks / Lord Breadalbane’s March KB.2: 5
Notes on Gaelic Titles
Bodaich nam Briogais Boddich na mbrigs DOW; Bodaich na’m Brigais / The Carles with the Breeks KB; Bodaich na’m Brigis / Lord Breadalbane’s March to the battle fought betwixt him and the Sinclairs of Caithness at Wick D1. The Carles with the Breeks. The Lowland Scots translation of the name introduced by Angus MacKay (KB) is not inappropriate since the area of Wick is culturally and geographically Lowland. For a verse beginning A bhodaich nan brigis… see D. Kennedy, A Laoidheadair Gaelic… An dara clo-bualadh. To which is added, Short tracts on the Reformation; The invasions of Coll Macdonald…[etc], copy in the National Library of Scotland, Blair (1836), p. 181. For other concordances and spellings see I.I. MacInnes, The Highland bagpipe: the impact of the Highland Societies of London and Scotland, 1781-1844, M. Litt. Thesis, Edinburgh University (1988), pp. 260-267; A.M. MacDonald, The relationship between pibroch and Gaelic song: its implications on the performance style of the pibroch ùrlar, MLitt Thesis, Edinburgh University (1995), pp 163-179; F. Buisman, ‘Transformations of piobaireachd in 18th-century Music Collections’, edited by R. D. Cannon, (n.d.).
Archive Recordings
1953 Pipe Major Ronald Lawrie
1961 Pipe Major John D Burgess
1962 Pipe Major Ronald Lawrie
1976 Pipe Major Duncan M MacLennan
Other Material
William Donaldson’s Set Tunes Notes (2017)
In Gaelic, ‘Bodach’ means ‘old man’, and is a contemptuous epithet for the defeated, who are as ineffectual as old men. That is the force of the word in the name of this tune, and is not conveyed by the now obsolete word ‘Carles’. ‘Losers’ is closer; I prefer ‘Loosers in Troosers’.