The 'Unmapped places' project is mapping previously unrecorded names and stories of the Cairngorm Mountains, Am Monadh Ruadh, as used by people who live or work in the hills.
These 'living' landscape names are the iceberg tips of social history and stories - they are oral records of the connection between people and land. Here, in the only sub-arctic habitat in Britain, connections with humans go back millennia.
The writer and activist Alastair McIntosh holds that cultural loss is ecological loss, and vice versa. Research from the James Hutton Institute shows that we are well into the last 10 years of consistent snow cover in the Cairngorms. Our home is changing before our very eyes. It looks different, smells different, feels different.
Against this backdrop of change, capturing place names in current everyday use helps to share lived-in, grounded knowledge, which may be unknown or undervalued amongst wider audiences. It may also help to evolve our 'view' of the mountains, adding richness, and making these human relationships more visible.
Today the hills are frequented by walkers, mountain bikers, climbers, reindeer herders, artists, Mountain Rescue and Ski Patrol teams, ecologists, crofters, archaeologists, stalkers and gamekeepers. Each group has their own names for and perspectives on the land - all unmapped and unrecorded.
The project will help to highlight these complex connections and relationships between land and people, and add to current debates on wildness, 're-wilding,' communities' inclusion and exclusion - in access, decision-making, livelihoods - and climate change.
It helps to tell the human story of a 'wild' landscape.
This project is kindly funded in 2025 by Fèisean nan Gàidheal under their Tasgadh fund, and also as part of the Healthy Planet, Healthy People Community Led Awards by The Williamson Trust and the RSE.
These 'living' landscape names are the iceberg tips of social history and stories - they are oral records of the connection between people and land. Here, in the only sub-arctic habitat in Britain, connections with humans go back millennia.
The writer and activist Alastair McIntosh holds that cultural loss is ecological loss, and vice versa. Research from the James Hutton Institute shows that we are well into the last 10 years of consistent snow cover in the Cairngorms. Our home is changing before our very eyes. It looks different, smells different, feels different.
Against this backdrop of change, capturing place names in current everyday use helps to share lived-in, grounded knowledge, which may be unknown or undervalued amongst wider audiences. It may also help to evolve our 'view' of the mountains, adding richness, and making these human relationships more visible.
Today the hills are frequented by walkers, mountain bikers, climbers, reindeer herders, artists, Mountain Rescue and Ski Patrol teams, ecologists, crofters, archaeologists, stalkers and gamekeepers. Each group has their own names for and perspectives on the land - all unmapped and unrecorded.
The project will help to highlight these complex connections and relationships between land and people, and add to current debates on wildness, 're-wilding,' communities' inclusion and exclusion - in access, decision-making, livelihoods - and climate change.
It helps to tell the human story of a 'wild' landscape.
This project is kindly funded in 2025 by Fèisean nan Gàidheal under their Tasgadh fund, and also as part of the Healthy Planet, Healthy People Community Led Awards by The Williamson Trust and the RSE.
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Unmapped places of the Cairngorms: stories from a living landscape
Get involved!
Workshops
Walking and indoor workshops will take place during summer and autumn 2025 across the Cairngorms, for people and groups who are based in or who work frequently in the high mountains of the Cairngorms, in order to collect and share stories of 'living' place names. See below for geographic area covered, but please note this is a soft boundary!
Anybody who uses their 'own' names for places is welcome to join and contribute. This may be anything from a place name just used within your family, to a name used generationally within a work team.
Details of public workshop sessions are posted below. If you'd like to arrange a workshop for your group or team, please contact me.
Upcoming public workshops
Sunday 12 October
Iona Gallery, Kingussie
2-4pm
Free; event now passed.
Sunday 26 October
St Margaret's, Braemar
11am-1pm
Free; event now passed.
Sat 1 November
Tiso Bothy, Aviemore (upstairs)
2-3pm
Free, register here.
Sun 2 November
Tiso Bothy, Aviemore (upstairs)
10-11am
Free, register here.
Project area (approximate)
Get involved!
Workshops
Walking and indoor workshops will take place during summer and autumn 2025 across the Cairngorms, for people and groups who are based in or who work frequently in the high mountains of the Cairngorms, in order to collect and share stories of 'living' place names. See below for geographic area covered, but please note this is a soft boundary!
Anybody who uses their 'own' names for places is welcome to join and contribute. This may be anything from a place name just used within your family, to a name used generationally within a work team.
Details of public workshop sessions are posted below. If you'd like to arrange a workshop for your group or team, please contact me.
Upcoming public workshops
Sunday 12 October
Iona Gallery, Kingussie
2-4pm
Free; event now passed.
Sunday 26 October
St Margaret's, Braemar
11am-1pm
Free; event now passed.
Sat 1 November
Tiso Bothy, Aviemore (upstairs)
2-3pm
Free, register here.
Sun 2 November
Tiso Bothy, Aviemore (upstairs)
10-11am
Free, register here.
Project area (approximate)
Map showing approximate area of study - the high hill ground. Place names may be captured outwith this, but the primary focus will be on the mountains and areas away from current settlements. Map from the CNPA website.
Submit place names online
Details of how to submit your own place names digitally will be shared shortly, especially for those who are unable to attend a workshop. This will include submitting name, location, any images, and any associated notes or story. These submissions will be added to an interactive online map, which will be published later in the year.
What next?
The collected place names and associated stories will be shared in winter 2025/26 through an interactive online map and resource, as well as local and online events, and a storytelling walk.
Details of how to submit your own place names digitally will be shared shortly, especially for those who are unable to attend a workshop. This will include submitting name, location, any images, and any associated notes or story. These submissions will be added to an interactive online map, which will be published later in the year.
What next?
The collected place names and associated stories will be shared in winter 2025/26 through an interactive online map and resource, as well as local and online events, and a storytelling walk.
Project lead
Sarah Hobbs is based in Aviemore and runs Storywalks to place stories back where they belong in the landscape and skyscape – very literally re-storying the land. The main focus of Storywalks uncovers and highlights quiet, hidden or silenced voices within the landscape, for example women’s stories, or colonial history. She is an accredited storyteller with the Scottish Storytelling Forum.
She has 20 years’ experience of working on place-based community-led social justice and systemic social inequities, including producing multimedia resources bringing people together from different backgrounds. She is also a former reindeer herder, which is where the seeds of this project began. Her academic background is Arabic and Social Anthropology. Read more about Sarah here.
She has 20 years’ experience of working on place-based community-led social justice and systemic social inequities, including producing multimedia resources bringing people together from different backgrounds. She is also a former reindeer herder, which is where the seeds of this project began. Her academic background is Arabic and Social Anthropology. Read more about Sarah here.