cairn

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English

The Cairn of Gavrinis, Brittany
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Etymology

From Scots cairn, from Scottish Gaelic càrn, from Old Irish carn, from Proto-Celtic *karnos, from Proto-Indo-European *ḱerh₂- (“horn”).

Compare Welsh carn, Cornish carn. Doublet of carn and horn.

Pronunciation

Noun

cairn (plural cairns)

  1. A rounded or conical heap of stones erected by early inhabitants of the British Isles, apparently as a sepulchral monument.
    Synonym: See burial mound § Synonyms
    • 1826, Thomas Campbell, “Glenara”, in The Poetical Works of Thomas Campbell, page 105:
      "Now here let us place the gray stone of her cairn: / Why speak ye no word!"—said Glenara the stern.
  2. A pile of stones heaped up as a landmark, to guide travelers on land or at sea, or to arrest attention, as in surveying, or in leaving traces of an exploring party, etc.
    Hypernym: marker
    • 1926, T. E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom, New York: Anchor, published 1991, page 180:
      After fifteen minutes of this we were glad to reach a high saddle on which former travellers had piled little cairns of commemoration and thankfulness.
  3. A cairn terrier.

Derived terms

Translations

terrier — see cairn terrier
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Further reading

Anagrams

French

Pronunciation

Noun

cairn m (plural cairns)

  1. cairn

Further reading

Irish

Pronunciation

Noun

cairn

  1. inflection of carn:
    1. vocative/genitive singular
    2. nominative/dative plural

Mutation

Irish mutation
Radical Lenition Eclipsis
cairn chairn gcairn
Note: Some of these forms may be hypothetical. Not every possible mutated form of every word actually occurs.

References

  1. ^ Quiggin, E. C. (1906) A Dialect of Donegal, Cambridge University Press, page 97
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