Cnicht


Cnicht is a mountain in Snowdonia which forms part of the Moelwynion mountain range.

Features

Its appearance when viewed from the south-west, i.e. from the direction of Porthmadog, has earned it the sobriquet the "Matterhorn of Wales", albeit being 3,789 metres lower. In reality Cnicht is a long ridge and, at 689 m, is the fifth-highest peak in the Moelwynion mountain range. It can be easily ascended from Croesor, the village at its foot, or, with more difficulty, from Nant Gwynant to the north-west.
Although rightly regarded by most people as a mountain in its own right, there are compilers of lists who consider that it does not in fact have enough prominence to separate it from its parent Allt-fawr in spite of over 110m of re-ascent and a distance of more than 4 km. Hence it is not regarded as a Marilyn.

Toponymy

The mountain gets its name from the old English word 'knight', the silent 'k' being pronounced at that time. It is said that the shape of the mountain bears a similarity to a knight's helmet.

In fiction

It appears as the "Saeth" in Patrick O'Brian's 1952 novel Three Bear Witness, which is set in a fictionalised version of Cwm Croesor. O'Brian and his wife lived in the valley between 1946 and 1949.