mountains
- 1Plural of mountain.
Thick clouds gathered over the mountains before the storm broke.
Climbers spend years training before they attempt the highest mountains.
Note
A regular plural, formed by adding -s, that carries more than the literal peaks. It also serves the figurative sense of a huge amount or heap, as in mountains of paperwork. The historical Malaga wine is uncountable and has no plural. When the plural refers to one connected chain rather than several separate peaks, it moves into the range meaning.
- 2A connected series of high peaks forming a single range that extends across a region.
The mountains separate the dry interior from the rainy coastal plain.
Settlers crossed the mountains through a narrow pass before winter arrived.
Note
Here the plural names one thing: a whole range treated as a single feature of the landscape. It usually takes the definite article, as in the mountains separate the interior from the coast. It keeps a plural verb even though only one range is meant. Context decides the reading. Crossing the mountains means crossing a region, not passing a number of separate peaks.
mountains is a form of mountain
mountain, noun: A large landform that rises steeply and prominently above the surrounding land, usually with only a small area at its peak. Full entry
- Forms
- mountainmountains plural
- Spelling
- mountain → mountains: add -s
Use it in a sentence
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