
Why Do We Celebrate St. Patrick’s Day?
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We celebrated St. Patrick's Day by getting married March 17. 1954. We were married until June 19. 2023 when my husband, Wes, passed away.
My question is why do have a picture of Scottish Highland Bagpipes on an article about Ireland? The Uillean pipes which are the Irish version of the bagpipes would be more appropriate. The uillean pipes use bellows rather than a blowpipe, are much softer in tone and have a two octave chromatic range, as opposed to Scottish Highland pipes, which use a blowpipe for air, can be heard from miles away, and have a very limited range. Just curious!
The Great Highland Bagpipes are pictured because most St Patrick's Day parades include pipe bands that play that particular instrument. Another name for the Great Highland Bagpipe is Irish War Pipe--the Irish developed them in the first place (although every culture on the planet has a bagpipe of some kind), and the Scots very enthusiastically adopted them.
What do you call a 7 course Irish dinner?
A baked potato and a 6-pack!
I first heard that joke years ago from my mother-in-law, who was from Belfast Northern Ireland! Happy Saint Pat's!
Me again. I just saw the comment below about “The Quiet Man" movie. That was one of my mother-in-law's favorite movies! Hubby and I like it, too.
I'm Irish and learned MUCH from your article. TY
We have the home decorated, play soft Irish tunes and enjoy the beef, cabbage , scones & desserts. Irish coffee and tea. This year we’ll have a reading of your information.
St Patrick's Day Fun Facts
Thank you for a great look in to our St. Patty's story. :-)
I am a little confused on the (approximate after all) dates though. On this page I read that he passed away around ~AD493.
Now - I keep coming up with AD ~386 for the year of his birth [+/- a year or three]. This makes me wonder about the date reported (~AD493) in this great write-up for his death.
The year I usually see tossed around is closer to AD ~461 .... putting his age at death around 75 years. I am not trying to be pedantic - I'm genuinely confused about this and don't know which is (closer to) right. Having said that, this (ÃÛÌÒÁµÈË) is the only page I have seen that puts St. Patrick's death so near to the end of the fifth century, which doesn't necessarily make it wrong. Among the other sources, most had the "feel" of religious sources, meaning they may originate from a singular religious info-source, thus reducing or negating the perceived reliability, blablah. . How certain are we here at ÃÛÌÒÁµÈË of our research findings?
To be clear, I've not performed exhaustive searches, I've found about five separate sources that list his life as ~AD386 to ~AD461 or thereabouts, and this informative almanac.com entry ;-)
Apologies for being "that guy" - but it is honestly a matter of me wanting to know. Perhaps ÃÛÌÒÁµÈË.com researched more intelligently, or discovered some convincing documentation that supports the later date for St. Patty's passing - I certainly don't know who's right. In any event, thank you for a thoughtfully presented and engaging article. :-)
Stephen Sean
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