Highland

How to spell highland

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce highland

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does highland mean?

1. nounAn area of high or mountainous land, as opposed to low-lying ground.
2. adjectiveRelating to or characteristic of an area of high or mountainous land.

Highland in a sentence

• noun

  The cottage sat on a windswept highland above the loch.

• adjective

  The festival featured highland dancing and bagpipe music.

• noun

  Farmers in the highland keep hardy sheep that cope with the cold.

• adjective

  Highland cattle have long shaggy coats to survive the harsh weather.

Where does highland come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a native English compound, built from two very old Germanic elements: 'high', which descends from the Old English heah meaning 'tall' or 'lofty', and 'land', which has meant 'ground' or 'region' across the Germanic languages for well over a thousand years. Put together, 'highland' simply describes ground that lies high, that is, elevated or mountainous country, in contrast to the low-lying 'lowland'. The pairing has been recorded in English since the late medieval period and gained special weight as a proper name for the mountainous north of Scotland, the Highlands, with all its associated culture of clans, kilts, and cattle. Because both halves are ordinary modern words, the spelling holds no real surprise; the only thing to watch is keeping the silent 'gh' of 'high', a fossilised spelling that once represented a throaty sound English long ago stopped pronouncing.

How the word is built

• high (elevated, from Old English heah)
• land (ground, region)