Roddy Maclean looks at the most common generics among the names of Scotland’s highest and most famous mountains.

Leugh ann an Gàidhlig / Read in Gaelic

For better or worse, Sir Hugh Munro left the people of Scotland a considerable legacy in his list of the mountains that top an altitude of 3,000 feet (914.4 metres). As befits a topography that is concentrated in the Gàidhealtachd, almost all of the names of the ‘Munros’ originate in Gaelic and thus provide a door into the world of Gaelic toponymy through which even non Gaelics-speakers regularly navigate (some more successfully than others).

So, here’s a question for you. Which is the most common mountain generic found in the names of the 282 Munros (we shall ignore the additional ‘tops’ for the purpose of this blog)? And which are in second and third place? You might wish to turn away from the text below and consider your answers before reading on!

When you read or hear the generic term in question does it conjure up an image of how the eminence might appear to the eye, or how difficult it might be of ascent? We have a very rich mountain topography in Gaelic Scotland, with over a hundred generics that appear in names of elevated places – slopes, summits, pinnacles and the like. However, only a handful dominate in the list of Munros.

The most numerous and significant is beinn, often anglicised ben – a fact that will be of little surprise to aficionados of Scotland’s mountains. The beinn names constitute 75 of the Munros – 27% of the total. The presence of the loanword ben in Scots and English attests to the significance of beinn to Scotland’s sense of being, although it is not confirmed in the literary record until the late 18^th century.

The word in Gaelic was originally beann [‘BYOWN’], in which form it still appears in the genitive plural case, as in the simile cho sean ri ceò nam beann ‘as old as the mist of the mountains’. The adjectival form beannach means ‘horned/pointed’, which indicates the original meaning of beann i.e. an animal’s horn. The word has not only undergone a semantic extension in now being applied more commonly to the landscape than to animal anatomy (and to mountains that do not resemble a horn), but it is now almost universally found in the slenderised form beinn. The reason for this is that beann is a feminine noun which in the dative or prepositional case naturally becomes slenderised as in air a’ bheinn ‘on the mountain’. The dative form beinn has now largely replaced the original nominative form beann. The ‘ei’ in beinn is pronounced AY, EYE or EE depending on dialect, and the terminal ‘nn’ is halfway between ‘n’ and ‘ng’ in English.

Beinn Àiliginn/Ben Alligin ‘the mountain of Alligin’ (centre) and Sgùrr Mòr ‘big peak’ (right), on the shores of Loch Torridon in Wester Ross, carry two of the most significant mountain generics in the Munros and, indeed, in the entire mountain landscape of the Scottish Highlands. © R Maclean

Our most famous beinn is, of course, Beinn Nibheis/Ben Nevis in Lochaber – the highest mountain in Scotland (although its meaning is a point of debate and would occupy too much space in this blog!). The second highest summit is also a beinn – Beinn MacDuibh/Ben Macdui in the Cairngorms; its name, meaning ‘mountain of the sons of Duff’, is slightly unusual in carrying a human appellation. The next beinn on the altitude list comes, perhaps surprisingly, down in tenth place. This is Beinn Labhair/Ben Lawers on Loch Tayside, named ultimately for the stream that runs off its eastern flank – Allt Labhair/Lawers Burn which means ‘talking burn’, a commentary on the noise made by the stream. It is followed in eleventh place by Beinn a’ Bhùird in the Cairngorms. This is Scotland’s ‘table mountain’ aptly named for its extended, flattish summit.

Beinn mountains are widely distributed across the country, with a slight preponderance in the west. The most northerly Munro is Ben Hope/Beinn Hòb in north Sutherland, and the most southerly is Ben Lomond/Beinn Laomainn ‘beacon mountain’ which lent its name to the famous loch. Occasionally the beinn element appears in lenited form after the descriptor, a relatively uncommon word order in Gaelic. These examples can sometimes be ascribed to Norse influence along the western seaboard, where a likely Old Norse name (in Norse word order) has been reinterpreted in Gaelic, with the generic beinn replacing the Norse generic fjall. Thus Blá Fjall ‘blue mountain’ on Skye became Blà Bheinn, anglicised Blaven.

Luinne Bheinn on nearby Knoydart has been (unsatisfactorily) explained in Gaelic as ‘angry mountain’, but a hill in the English Lake District might suggest a Norse alternative. This is Ling Fell ‘heather mountain’, derived from Old Norse (common Heather, Calluna vulgaris, is sometimes referred to as ‘ling’ in English). In Scotland, did Norse Lyng Fjall ‘heather (or perhaps berry) mountain’ become modern Gaelic Luinne Bheinn?

The second most common generic among the Munros has a distinctly western distribution, being dominant on the Isle of Skye, and significant on the western Highland mainland, but not extending to the southern or northern Highlands. It also might originate in Old Norse. This is sgùrr [‘SKOOR’ with a long ‘oo’], which generally applies to a steep and rocky mountain with a distinct summit, and often enjoying a dramatic appearance. Thirty-eight (13%) of the Munros are named with Sgùrr, and this generic dominates the toponymy of the Black Cuillin, the rugged gabbro hills in the south of Skye.

Sgùrr is the dominant mountain generic in the Cuillin of Skye, as shown in the map above. Rocky and with a distinct summit, sgùrr mountains are pleasing to the eye of those who love a rugged landscape. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland.

Because of its distribution, and perhaps its later addition to the Gaelic vocabulary (in comparison with beinn), sgùrr as a generic did not cross over as a loan into Scots or English. Thus, all of the Sgùrr mountain names among the Munros remain today in their pure Gaelic form. Examples are Sgùrr nan Eag ‘the peak of the notches’ in the Cuillin, Sgùrr na Lapaich ‘the peak of the bogland’ in Glen Affric and Sgùrr Èilde Mòr ‘big hind (female deer) peak’ in the Mamore Forest; the last is a fairly unusual example of this generic, being east of the Great Glen.

Remaining to the east of the Great Glen, we commonly come across the third most frequent mountain generic in the Munros – Càrn or its anglicised form Cairn, which make up 12% (33) of the total. Readers will be familiar with the important place of piles of stones in the Scottish cultural landscape (some built for wayfinding, others to mark coffin trails or significant locations), and how the Scots/English term ‘cairn’ is derived from Gaelic càrn (although this blogger has met Australians of Highland ancestry in the state of Victoria who maintain the tradition of building cairns on mountain tops and who pronounce the word in the Gaelic manner). The fourth and sixth highest of the Munros – both in the Cairngorms – are Cairn Toul/Càrn an t-Sabhail ‘the hill of the barn’ and Cairn Gorm/An Càrn Gorm ‘the blue hill’. In ninth place on the list is Càrn Mòr Dearg ‘big red hill’ which is joined to the summit of Ben Nevis by a knife-edge ridge that would be known in Gaelic as a faobhar. However, to modern climbers it bears a slightly improbable linguistic combination as the Càrn Mòr Dearg Arête.

The landscape around Scotland’s highest mountain shows four of the major hill generics – beinn (ben), meall, càrn and aonach. The narrow ridge connecting Ben Nevis to Càrn Mòr Dearg on detailed modern maps bears a distinct if unlikely combination of Gaelic and French, being known as the Càrn Mòr Dearg Arête. Reproduced with the permission of the National Library of Scotland.

Meall is another well-known Scottish mountain generic, although regularly mispronounced by non-Gaelic speakers. It is not ‘MEE-ul’ (mial is the Gaelic for ‘louse’) but ‘MYOWL’ (as in ‘owl’, the bird). Meallan (the plural) are ‘lumps’ of hills and mountains; many are not particularly distinguished in outline and often do not possess a distinct summit. But many of them are lovely to walk on, and they have been treated a bit unfairly by commentators.

The generic meall is actually more common than beinn in the Scottish landscape, but among the higher mountains, beinn is much more frequent. On a hierarchy of altitude, the highest meall is in 36th place. This is Meall Garbh ‘rough mountain’, a name shared with over twenty other hills and mountains, many in Argyll or the Central Highlands. They might be ‘lumps’ but that doesn’t mean they are smooth! A fairly impressive example is Meall a’ Bhùiridh ‘the hill of the (stag) roaring’, near the eastern entrance to Glen Coe.

Another notable Munro generic is stob [‘STOP’], which counts for 15 of the total. Although likely to be a loanword from Scots, meaning originally a ‘post’ or ‘stake’, it has taken on a life of its own in Gaelic. In common vernacular we say of something that is sticking up above something else – tha e a’ stobadh an-àirde. In a sporting context, stob is used for a ‘stump’ in cricket, and in the landscape, it has become a mountain generic, representing a rocky top sticking above the rest of the landscape in the Cairngorms (and not always meriting status as a separate ‘Munro’), or a grander and more impressive summit in Lochaber and Glencoe.

The sense of a ‘stob’ sticking up above an adjacent feature is demonstrated by the fact that no fewer than ten of the Munros that carry this generic are named for the corrie below. Examples are Stob Coire an Laoigh ‘the mountain of the corrie of the calf’ in the Grey Corries of Lochaber and, on either side of Loch Treig, Stob Coire Easain ‘mountain of the corrie of [the] small waterfall’ and Stob Coire Sgrìodain ‘mountain of the corrie of scree’.

Six Munros are named with the generic creag [‘KRAKE’] which can appear in the anglicised form Craig. It means a ‘crag’ or ‘rocky hill’ and need not be particularly high, although it generally is somewhat rugged, at least on one side; it is extremely common in the Gaelic landscape. The highest example in the country is the lovely Creag Meagaidh above Loch Laggan; its name means ‘rocky mountain at the boggy place’. Creag Leacach in the Angus hills is ‘rocky mountain of slabs’. And the derived adjective creagach ‘rocky’ is abundant throughout the Highlands.

Five Munros carry the generic mullach [‘MOOL-uch’ with a broad ‘l’], and this is hardly surprising, as the word is the Gaelic equivalent to the English ‘summit’. Ràinig i am mullach ‘she reached the summit’ could be used of any mountain top, and we also refer to the roof of a house as a ‘mullach’. Examples of names among the Munros are Mullach Fraoch-choire ‘summit of heather-corrie’ in Glen Affric and Mullach Clach a’ Bhlàir ‘the summit of the stone of the field or battle’ in the Cairngorms.

With regard to the ten highest Munros, we are yet to look at two mountain generics that appear within their ranks. The third highest summit in Scotland (at 1,296 m) belongs to Am Bràigh Riabhach, anglicised Braeriach. The name, meaning ‘the brindled upland’, is an apt description of the wide and wonderful summit plateau where the conditions are so rough that much bare ground appears between the plants that grow there, giving the landscape a brindled appearance at a distance.

The brindled appearance of the wide expanse of the Braeriach plateau in the Cairngorms is reflected in the mountain’s name Am Bràigh Riabhach ‘the brindled upland’. In local Gaelic, the ‘bh’ in riabhach is not pronounced, hence the anglicised form. © R Maclean

Bràigh [‘BRAA-ee’] is the upper part of something and in human anatomy it can refer to the upper part of the chest. Both it and its inflected form bràghad [‘BRAA-ut’] can represent broad uplands which often carry a great sense of remoteness. Another example of a bràigh among the Munros is Seana Bhràigh, ‘old upland’ in Ross-shire.

Finally, there is another significant mountain generic, well known to Gaelic-speakers, but less well appreciated in the general Scottish community (and often mispronounced). This is aonach – and half a dozen Munros carry this generic, with two of them in the ‘top ten’ measured on altitude. The word is pronounced ‘OEUN -uch’ (not ‘AN-uch’), with the ‘ao’ in Gaelic representing a vowel sound similar to ‘oeu’ in French oeuf ‘egg’. It can be defined as a ‘high moor or mountain usually with a summit ridge and steep sides’.

The word appears in traditional Gaelic bàrdachd (poetry). For example, in an 18^th century paean for a deceased clan chief, Alasdair Dubh MacDonnell of Glengarry, the bardess Sìleas na Ceapaich wrote of him:

Bu tu Beinn Nibheis thar gach aonach, Bu tu ʼchreag nach fhaoidte theàrnadh;

‘You were Ben Nevis above every high mountain; you were the unscalable crag’.

Notably she employed the noun aonach to give the reader an image of a steep high mountain, towering above others – as did Alasdair Dubh above his peers in a metaphorical sense.

Perhaps the best-known examples of aonaichean (the plural form), and indeed the highest two of the five on Munro’s list, are the paired Aonach Beag and Aonach Mòr east of Ben Nevis, the latter having been developed for skiing. Interestingly, the ‘smaller’ one – Aonach Beag – is actually a few metres higher than the other but, of course, the eye can deceive. And mountaineers might consider the impressive Aonach Eagach [‘oeu-nuch EK-uch’] of Glencoe to be more deserving of praise. Standing in the glen below, the observer sees a high mountain ridge with a series of notches along its length. This confirms the accuracy of the name which might be translated as ‘notched high-ridged steep mountain’.

Aonach Mòr near Fort William is well-named. It has a distinct summit ridge and steep sides, one of which (not being too steep!) has been developed for skiing. © R Maclean

Before we leave the mountains behind us, I would like to share something with you from one of our oldest Gaelic dictionaries – the one produced by Perthshire man Robert Armstrong over two hundred years ago in 1825. Under the English headword ‘Mountaineer’ he gives us Sliabhair, based on sliabh, an old word for a mountain, but also meaning ‘moorland’. Over the last two centuries, Sliabhair has become largely archaic in Gaelic Scotland. But the lexicographer also includes this: ‘A Scotch (sic) mountaineer, Gaidheal.’ A ‘mountaineer’ is a ‘Gael’. Being among those who love the traditional Gaelic relationship with our mountainous land, I have to admit that Armstrong’s definition pleased me!

This blog was written by Inverness-based writer and broadcaster Roddy (Ruairidh) Maclean, whose work highlights the connections between the Gaelic language and Scotland’s environment.