Okay, I know how this could go straight away but I am going to try and get the "real" answer to this question and the source of the answer (if known).

Here goes - control yourselves:

Why are mountains referred to as being female?

Example: Ships are referred to as being female.

Fire away, but I really would like the historic answer.

I wonder how mount Sir Sandford, Sir Donald, Robson and many others feel about your question.

I'm not so sure that they always are. At least I don't refer to all mountains as she, particularly when the mountain is named after a man. I have always referred to Mount Agassiz in the Sierra as "him", but most of the time I refer to mountains as "it". I don't know why... am I wrong?

Fletch wrote:

CindyAbbott wrote:Why are mountains referred to as being female?

Cold and unforgiving.

CindyAbbott wrote:
Why are mountains referred to as being female?

you always try hard to get up it but will always go down.

Well, I have finshed a climbed and thought (or said) she was a real b------

But seriously, is it based on the name on the mountain? Or, if not named, they are considered female (as boats and ships - which I have no idea why - but they are)?

FortMental wrote:beautiful and aloof....

I like it!

CindyAbbott wrote:Well, I have finshed a climbed and thought (or said) she was a real b------

But seriously, is it based on the name on the mountain? Or, if not named, they are considered female (as boats and ships - which I have no idea why - but they are)?

My brothers and I own a boat named the "Eh De Lemne" which was a sort of stutter my dad did at the beginning of most sentences. We figured since hurricanes are no longer solely female it was time to break with that tradition in boats as well.

Only she can be a B----. If the mountain was a mother f-----, then it was a he.

Why are we not cussing btw?

I must have been living in a different universe. I don't recall hearing mountains described as feminine, and there are few outwardly feminine names (e.g. La Madre) that I remember. If anything, female names seem underrepresented, as many were given the last names of men. Maybe this gender-identification is more common in the Himalayas?

NancyHands wrote:

CindyAbbott wrote:Only she can be a B----. If the mountain was a mother f-----, then it was a he.

Why are we not cussing btw?

Ok, you all are killing me

So is it a myth?

A medieval (and perhaps inherited from much earlier) example:

Though Petrarch's ascent of Mont Ventoux is now best understood as a fiction and an allegory, he referred to the mountain by the locals' name for it, Brother.

Locally, Tibrogargan is male, Beerwah is female and Coonowrin is male according to the dreamtime creation story of the mountains. I'm not sure that the lesser peaks and rocks have any specified gender even though they are "children" of Tibrogargan and Beerwah.

Personally I don't attribute gender to mountains. I just consider them neuter, same as pencils and keyboards.

I just found this:

The exact reason why boats are called she in English is lost to history. While explanations abound, most appear to be of the folk variety, assumed or invented after the fact as a way to make sense of the phenomenon. Boats are a truly interesting case in English, as they are among the only inanimate objects that take a gendered pronoun, whereas most others are called it. Countries are also called she, as are cars sometimes, but the latter example is almost certainly an extension from boats.

One plausible theory is that boats are called she because they are traditionally given female names, typically the name of an important woman in the life of the boat's owner, such as his mother. It has also been surmised that all ships were once dedicated to goddesses, and later to important mortal women when belief in goddesses waned. Interestingly, although male captains and sailors historically attributed the spirit of a benevolent female figure to their ships, actual women were considered very bad luck at sea.

Back to mountains, then it is based of the name of each mountain: if the mountain has a gender-based name. But what about mountains with names like Mt. Aconcagua?

CindyAbbott wrote:Well, I have finshed a climbed and thought (or said) she was a real b------

But seriously, is it based on the name on the mountain? Or, if not named, they are considered female (as boats and ships - which I have no idea why - but they are)?

Well, in your particular case, Chomolungma is a she.

Mountains are like God - no idea what gender, so I prefer calling them 'she'.

The initial route to get on top is usually a struggle