Ben Venue

A historical perspective, drawn from the Ordnance Gazetteer of Scotland: A Survey of Scottish Topography, Statistical, Biographical and Historical, edited by Francis H. Groome and originally published in parts by Thomas C. Jack, Grange Publishing Works, Edinburgh between 1882 and 1885.

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Ben Venue (Gael. beinn - mheadhonaidh, 'middle mountain'), a mountain in Aberfoyle parish, Perthshire, flanking the S side of the lower waters of Loch Katrine and the main part of the Trossachs, and culminating 10 miles W by S of Callander. Rising almost murally from the margin of Loch Katrine, it surges upward to 2393 feet above sea-level, and commands extensive views to the N, the E, and the W, including much of the territory celebrated in the -Lady of the Lake. It shows rich fleckings and interminglings of verdure, natural wood, and naked rock; it exhibits a lofty terrace-pass and a stupendous corrie, noticed in our article on Bealach-nam-Bo; it combines, more than almost any other mountain, the characters of grandeur, romance, and beauty; and, as to its aggregate configuration, it looks like an immense heap of broken hillocks, thus answering closely to Sir Walter Scott's description:

'Crags, knolls, and mounds, confusedly hurl'd,
The fragments of an earlier world.'

An accompanying 19th C. Ordnance Survey map is available, or use the map tab to the right of this page.

Note: This text has been made available using a process of scanning and optical character recognition. Despite manual checking, some typographical errors may remain. Please remember this description dates from the 1880s; names may have changed, administrative divisions will certainly be different and there are known to be occasional errors of fact in the original text, which we have not corrected because we wish to maintain its integrity. This information is provided subject to our standard disclaimer

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