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You only need to look at a map of the Highlands to notice that there are Gaelic names everywhere. They describe features in the landscape both large and small. Tomnahurich (Tom na h-Iùbhraich) in Inverness, known for its stories of fairies (sìthichean), means ‘the hill of the yew wood.' The village of Kingussie (Ceann a’ Ghiùthsaich) means ‘the end of the pine forest,’ with giùthsach meaning pine forest.
For someone who doesn’t speak the language, simply trying to pronounce some of these words can be intimidating. But even with a small amount of Gaelic, a different world begins to open up. You notice figures from folklore, such as Fionn MacCumhail or the Cailleach. You notice names for animals now extinct or scarce, trees or forests which are no longer standing, and shielings, pathways and illicit stills almost forgotten.
To explore this link between language and landscape, we ran a series of online Gaelic workshops earlier this year with author, educator, journalist and native speaker Roddy Maclean. More than 100 people attended these locally-advertised workshops. We explored the place names of Scottish hills and mountains, trees and plants, coastlines and islands, as well as features particular to the Glenmoriston area, home to our Dundreggan Rewilding Centre.
The popularity of the workshops is promising. When it opens next year, the centre will include Gaelic language and culture throughout. Language can tell you how a landscape has been used throughout time, and who, or what, has lived there. It can tell you of particular events or rituals. And significantly for rewilders and conservationists, language gives us an exciting glimpse, in this changed landscape we have inherited, of what could return.
It is important to point out that neither the resurgence in Gaelic nor the growing interest in rewilding are about going back in time. Both are about the present and the future. The decisions we make now about our landscape and our culture, and how we connect the two, will have repercussions for generations to come. If we don’t understand how we’ve got to where we are, how are we to move forward and leave our children something worth inheriting: a healthy, thriving environment?
The Gaelic in Landscape online workshops were kindly funded by NatureScot. Featured images are from our Gaelic map of Dundreggan, a collaborative project led by Alec Finlay.