I’m currently reading a fascinating book, Map of a Nation: A Biography of the Ordnance Survey by Rachel Hewitt, and came across an interesting mountain name – Schehallion – which the author says that she was told means “constant storm” in Gaelic, a suitable name as the weather on the mountain is apparently notoriously bad. I thought this unlikely, but couldn’t work out the original Gaelic name from the anglicised version, so I thought I’d investigate.

The mountain in questions is known as Schiehallion or The Maiden’s Pap in English, and the Gaelic name is Sìth Chailleann /ʃi’xal̪ˠʲən̪ˠ/. Sìth means hill or mount, and also fairy, and Cailleann is the Gaelic form of Caledonia, which was the Latin name for what is now Scotland. Wikipedia says that the name can be translated as “”fairy hill of the Caledonians”.