What are Munros, Corbetts, Grahams/Fionas, Donalds & Tops

Sir Hugo Munro created the first list of Scottish mountains in 1891. His original list included 283 summits over 3000ft and 255 subsidiary tops. The Scottish Mountaineering Club (SMC), of which he was a founding member, published it and still maintains the list, along with the list of Corbetts, Grahams/Fionas and Donalds

Munro's original list (actually called a table) of munros started the pastime of munro bagging and is why they're called munros. However, in a sad twist of irony, Sir Hugh Munro never actually climbed all 283 Munros, dying of pneumonia in 1909 just a few Munros short of becoming the first Munrosist. Reverend A. E. Robertson earned the title in 1901, successfully climbing all of Munro's original list.

Today, the UK government legally defines a mountain under Section 1, Clause 2 of the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 as any land over 600m (1969ft). Land under 600m is a hill. However, the list of Munros, Corbetts, Grahams/Fionas and Donalds is an informal classification maintained by the SMC based on a mountain's height and prominence.

The imperial system of measurement is still used to classify Munros, Corbetts, and Grahams/Fionas and Donalds, maintaining historical and cultural traditions dating back to Sir Hugo Munro's original list.

What are Munros

Munros are Scottish mountains above 3000ft (914.4m). Unlike Corbetts and Grahams/Fionas and Donalds, Munros have no strict prominence rule. Prominence is the drop in height between the summit and the next highest peak. Instead, the SMC uses the subjective criteria "separate mountain" with "sufficient separation" from other mountains.

The table of Munros has changed since Sir Hugo Munro compiled his original table in 1891, using modern technology to measure height and prominence more accurately. Today we use satellites (GNSS) and ground-based surveying carried out by Ordnance Survey to determine a mountain's height and subsequent Munro status.

The last change was in September 2012, when Beinn a' Chlaidheimh was demoted from a Munro to a Corbett after it was found to be 44 centimeters short of Munro status. Its height was measured at 913.96m (2,999ft).

There are currently 282 Munros.

The SMC maintains a voluntary list of people who have bagged all the Munros, known as Munroists.

What are Corbetts

Corbetts are named after John Rooke Corbett (1876 – 1949), who, like Sir Hugh Munro, compiled the first list of all Scottish mountains between 2500 and 3000ft (762.0 and 914.4m) with a prominence of 500ft (152.4m)

In another twist of irony in Scotland's mountain classifications, Corbett's list, which he produced in the 1920s, wasn't published until after his death. The SMC published it in 1953 after Corbett's sister gave it to them. 

Corbett was the 4th person to complete all the Munros and the first Englishman to do so. He was also a member of the SMC.

There are currently 222 Corbetts

By climbing all 222 Corbetts, you are affectionally called a Corbetter.

What are Grahams & Fionas

There is a tragic story about Grahams/Fionas… but I will save the tragedy for a future article!

Fionas are peaks between 2000ft (609m) and 2500ft (762m) with a drop of at least 500ft (150m). The new Grahams list extends this to include all peaks over 600m. 

However, it isn’t that simple! Let me explain.

Alan Dawson wrote The Relative Hills of Britain, published by Cicerone Press in April 1992, in which he compiled a list of all peaks between 2000ft and 2500ft called Elsies (short for Lesser Corbetts, i.e., LCs). 

In 1992, about 6 months after Alan Dawson published his list, Fiona Torbet (née Graham) (1931-1993) published her list of Scottish hills between 2,000 and 2,500ft with at least 150m of prominence in the Great Outdoors magazine (TGO).

These lists excluded Scotland's Southern Uplands.

Fiona and Dawson’s met to combine their lists and decided to use Dawson's list with a few amendments. This list became known as the Grahams

However, this arrangement changed in 2022.

In 2016, Alan Dawson obtained a registered trademark for ‘Grahams’ with restrictions on the name's use, including the need to obtain a commercial license. In 2022, Dawson then lowered the limit for Grahams from 2000ft (609.6m) to 600m and added 12 more mountains to the new metric Grahams list.

For these reasons, people have started moving away from the updated Graham's list, reverting to Fiona Torbet (née Graham)'s combined post-1992 list, including the SMC.

The SMC has stated that climbing the additional 12 post-2022 hills is not required to have ‘bagged’ all the hills within the 2000ft to 2500ft classification.

The name Fiona has been used in memory of Fiona Torbet, who was murdered on a walking holiday. I told you it was tragic!

There are 219 Fionas and 231 new Grahams.

What are Donalds

Donalds are ‘elevations’ in the Scottish Lowlands (south of the Highland boundary fault) at least 2000ft (610 m) high, with a drop of at least 50ft (15.2m) between elevations. In addition, further elevations must have a drop of at least 100ft (30.5m) and “sufficient topographical merit”.

There's more — the SMC also defines Donalds as being "defined from Donald Tops, where a Hill is the highest Top with a separation of 17 units or less. A unit is either 1⁄12 mile (130 m) along a Top's connecting ridge or 50 feet (15 m) in elevation between the Top and its connecting bealach/col. The separation is the sum of these two measures."

Donalds are named after Percy Donald, who compiled and published the list of these hills in 1935. Percy Donald was also a member of the SMC.

There are 141 summits

• 89 Donalds
• 52 Donald Tops.

What are Tops

Tops are subsidiary peaks to a main summit, but can’t qualify for individual Munro, Corbett, Graham/Fiona, or Donald status because they lack height, separation, or prominence.

The SMC defines Munro Tops as “The list of distinct Scottish peaks of 3000ft and over that fail to meet the criteria of "sufficient separation" from their neighbouring peaks”

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