machair

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noun

A type of calcareous sandy terrain formed mostly from seashells, found by the coast in areas of Scotland and Ireland.

OriginScottish Gaelic machair →
Scrabble 14
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Meanings

nounmachair (countable and uncountable, plural machairs)

plural machairs

  1. countableuncountablegeographyA type of calcareous sandy terrain formed mostly from seashells, found by the coast in areas of Scotland and Ireland.

    Burials had been found north and south of Applecross, preserved in the soils of sandy coastal meadows known as machair.

    2023 February 24, “Bones under Highlands kitchen floor are Iron Age burial site”, in BBC News

Origin

  1. Scottish Gaelicmachair
  2. Scottish Gaelicmachair
  3. Englishmachair

Borrowed from Scottish Gaelic machair.

More words from Scottish Gaelic

Full word history & related roots →

Rhymes & wordplay

Anagrams

AmharicMaricha
Cite this entry
APA

machair. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/machair

MLA

“machair.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/machair. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “machair,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/machair.

Source: machair on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.