I once asked about a few tunes with Gaelic titles, including "Fear a Figue" as played by Andrew Rankine. No answer was forthcoming at that time, but last night one of my students explained:
'A "pig" is an old Scots term for a stone bottle made to contain hot water to heat up your bed - what you'd call a hot water bottle. The gaelic word for this bottle is "phige", and the man who supplied these bottles was called the bottle man, or "fear a' phige", and it wasn't necessarily hot water which was supplied with the bottle!' So that seems the most likely explanation so far! X:122 T:Fear A Figue D:Horses for Courses by the Riverside Ceilidh Band Z:Nigel Gatherer M:4/4 L:1/8 K:A A>Ac>e A>Ac>e|A>Ac>A F2 E2|A>Ac>e A>Ac>e|A>Ac>A B2 B2| A>Ac>e A>Ac>e|A>Ac>A F2 E2|A>AA>A f>ec<A|B>AB<c A2 A2|] A>AA>A A>AA>A|A>AA>A F2 E2|A>AA>A A>AA>A|A>AA>A c2 B2| A>AA>A A>AA>A|A>AA>A F2 E2|A>AA>A f>ec<A|B>AB<c A2 A2|] -- Nigel Gatherer, Crieff, Scotland Friday-Monday: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Tuesday-Thursday: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Posted to Scots-L - The Traditional Scottish Music & Culture List - To subscribe/unsubscribe, point your browser to: http://www.tullochgorm.com/lists.html
