WARNING: Pedant alert! Barrygeo, let's get a bit more precise. Gaelic is not a language. It is a family of languages. I believe what you are referring to is Gaeilge, or Irish. I am in agreement with the contention that it depends on the language being spoken.

I don't know why we continue to argue over what to call the Uilleann Pipes. It seems to me that the history of them answers it satisfactorily. First off, their are a number of forerunners to the present day UP's. Certainly the Musette figures in, and the Pastoral Pipes are one of the immediate forerunners with the regulators, etc. The early name of the bellows blown, two octave chanter, and regulator pipe we now call the Uilleann Pipes was most certainly the Union Pipe. Later, Irish speakers changed it to the elbow pipe, or Uilleann (from the Irish word uillin for elbow or angle), and it has been known as such since. It is not solely Irish in origin, but the style it is played in has certainly been developed for the most part by the Irish. The Travelling Folk had much to do with this. It has been the Irish, both in Ireland and around the world, that have taken it to the level it is now at.

So, it is fine to call them Union Pipes as that was there original name. But we, Irish born and Irish descended, prefer to use the name that our own people have given these pipes, and by which they have been primarily known for the last hundred years or so.

Mick