oil on canvas,
100cm x 50cm,
Iain White, 2016,
£385
This view from the top of the broad southern flank of Arcuil (Arkle)looks north along the summit ridge with Coir Uairidh dropping away to the left and with the deep corrie of Am Bathaich to the right of the ridge. The summit ridge then sweeps round to the north east enclosing Am Bathaich, revealing the basal quartzite and pipe rock of the Cambrian in its south east facing wall. To the north of the ridge the mountain presents a misleadingly rounded elevation to an observer to the north west (see No. 9).
In the foreground and on the adjacent slope blockfields and ‘mountain top detritus’ are evident. This material is variously interpreted as pre- or inter- glacial weathered mantle modified by frost shattering that escaped erosion as it lay above the maximum height of the ice sheet (trimline).
Alternatively it is suggested that these areas were covered by thin static cold based ice, frozen to the ground surface at altitudes above moving warm/wet based and erosive ice in the corries and on the lower slopes. Again the effect was to protected the pre-existing weathered material from erosion.
Ref: 11
