Lammermuir Hills

The Lammermuir Hills, usually simply called the Lammermuirs (An Lomair Mòr in Gaelic) (occasionally anglicised Lammermoors), in southern Scotland, form a natural boundary between Lothian and the Scottish Borders.

They span the areas of East Lothian Council and the Scottish Borders Council, and they extend from Gala Water to St. Abb's Head, and offer a traditional site for sheep grazing.

The hills are nowhere especially high, the highest points being Meikle Says Law at 535 m and the Lammer Law at 528 m, but steep gradients, exposure to the elements and a lack of natural passes combine to form a formidable barrier to communications between Edinburgh and the Borders. The hills are crossed by only one major road (the A68), which crosses the shoulder of Soutra Hill between Lauder and Pathhead, and is frequently closed by snow in winter. The main road linking Edinburgh to England (the A1) avoids the hills by following a circuitous route around the coast.

Although the hills are now largely used as rough grazing pasture and moorland, the muir (English: moor) element of the name is in fact derived from the Goidelic word mor, meaning large. The bare, open nature of the modern landscape is due to relatively recent deforestation, and when the hills were named they would have been largely forested.

White Castle was an Iron Age hill fort, settled by the ancestors of the Votadini tribe.

Sir Walter Scott's historical novel The Bride of Lammermoor is set in the area, as is Gaetano Donizetti's opera Lucia di Lammermoor which is itself based on Scott's novel.

Two ranges of hills in New Zealand, the Lammermoor Range and Lammerlaw Range are named after the Scottish hills and their second highest point respectively.

See also

• List of places in East Lothian
• Marilyns in the area

External links

• Guide to walking in the Lammermuir Hills
• Anti-windfarm Group

This article incorporates text from the public domain 1907 edition of The Nuttall Encyclopædia.

Coordinates: 55°50′N 2°44′W / 55.833°N 2.733°W / 55.833; -2.733

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