The most popular event at the three-week Edinburgh summer festival takes place every evening in front of an old castle that stands on hill above the city. Thousands of visitors watch as bands march to the sound of bagpipes and drums.In attractive kilts - each in the pattern, or tartan, of a clan - the marchers make a very colorful picture.

The first International Festival (and the first Festival Fringe, although it wasn't known as such until later) took place in 1947, in the wake of the Second World War, with an optimistic remit to 'provide a platform for the flowering of the human spirit' and enrich the cultural life of Scotland, Britain and Europe. The founders of the Festival included Rudolf Bing, (then the General Manager of Glyndebourne Opera Festival), Henry Harvey Wood the Head of the British Council in Scotland, and a group of civic leaders from the City of Edinburgh. The festivals have taken place every August since.


Edinburgh is the capital of Scotland.It is an old city, but not the biggest ( Glasgow is twice as big) . From the top of the hill the castle looks down on the Old Town with its lovely houses 10 to 14 stories high. As people here like to say," Edinburgh had skyscrapers three centuries ago when New York was still a village ".Farther on is the Palace of Holyrood-house, home of Mary , Queen of Scots ,whose son James VI of Scotland also become James I of England (1603) . In another part of the city were the homes of famous people like inventor Alexander Graham Bell , writers Robert Louis Stevenson and sir Walter Scott . Edinburgh has long been a university town - since the 16th century , although this is not the oldest university in Scotland ( St.Andrews, 1411 ).


        

A land of mountains , Scotland has only a very small part - between Glasgow and Edinburgh - which is good for farming , and most people are finding jobs in electronics, a new industry also the center of industry. Off the coast of Scotland there are many islands. Probably the best known are the Shetland Islands because of small ponies that are favorites with children who are learning to ride. As in many countries, football is very popular but did you know that , besides whiskey , the game of golf also originally same from Scotland ? Edinburgh has twelve golf courses !


History of bagpipes
Wind instrument consisting of two or more single-reed or double-reed pipes, the reeds being set in motion by wind fed by arm pressure on an animal-skin (or rubberized-cloth) bag. The pipes are held in wooden sockets (stocks) tied into the bag, which is inflated either by the mouth (through a blowpipe with a leather nonreturn valve) or by bellows strapped to the body.

Nobody really knows when was made first bagpipe. Bagpipes were invented in the Middle East a long time ago, and were probably introduces into Britain by the Greeks, or more likely the Romans. Both had contact with the Britons, and so either seems possible. They were certainly there when the Romans had been in Britain for a few years, as there are carvings of bagpipe players. How long the pipes took to reach Scotland is unknown, but Northumbria has their own set of similar pipes.