Learning resources at Culloden

Transcript

What if John Lorne Campbell had never written this book?
His first book, it contains some of the most important and vibrant Gaelic poetic representations of events at the Battle of Culloden.
The songs of well-known bards such as Alasdair Mac Mhaighstir Alasdair, Rob Donn and Uilleam Ros, teamed with John's introduction and accompanying notes, greatly help us to place the importance of the songs into the context of the Battle and its consequences.

['Aiseirigh' - The Jacobite Bard, Alasdair MacMhaighstir Alasdair's greatest work, in Canna House today ...]

Many of the songs had never been written down before Campbell collected them.
The songs tell us about the Jacobite struggle, the people who endured it and the longer-reaching aftermath.
Later, Margaret Fay Shaw also worked on transcriptions of the songs ...

[Margaret Fay Shaw's transcription of 'Oran Eile air Latha Chuil-Lodair']

John collected songs from contributors such as Ruairidh Iain Bhain and Annie Johnston of Barra.

[Ruairidh Iain Bhain.]

If we had no Oran do'n Phrionnsa (Song to the Prince), An Suaithneas Ban (The White Cockade) or Am Breacan Uallach (The Proud Plaid), how much less could we appreciate the stories.
How much less colour and emotion would be contained in our mind's vision and imagination. Not to hear the cry of the widow's pain ...

[Cumha do dh'Uilleam Siosal ...
The Chisholm Lament ...]

Or to contemplate the predicament of the Highlander himself.

All the material seen and heard here is taken from the Canna Archives of John and Margaret Campbell.