as in piles
a small quantity of stones heaped together that usually marks a place
A cairn of loose stones marked the site.
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Recent Examples of cairns
The Park Service recommends that people not disturb, knock down or add to cairns, though some parks caution visitors not to rely on them as official pathways.
—
Noah Lyons,
San Diego Union-Tribune,
24 Jan. 2026
Above the glacial lake Ullswater, prehistoric cairns and burial mounds dot the high moorland, including the Cockpit Stone Circle, which spans 90 feet.
—
Andrea Bussell,
Travel + Leisure,
27 Dec. 2025
Found around the perimeter ring, there are six additional cairns.
—
Mike Bezemek,
Outside,
29 Oct. 2025
Noah Lyons,
San Diego Union-Tribune,
24 Jan. 2026
Above the glacial lake Ullswater, prehistoric cairns and burial mounds dot the high moorland, including the Cockpit Stone Circle, which spans 90 feet.
—
Andrea Bussell,
Travel + Leisure,
27 Dec. 2025
Found around the perimeter ring, there are six additional cairns.
—
Mike Bezemek,
Outside,
29 Oct. 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for cairns
Noun
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What was left of other buildings were buried under piles of their own debris.
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Idling trucks, sandbag piles and large metal trailers stationed around a massive cold storage facility that burned for days in Boyle Heights signaled that the work to clean up millions of pounds of spoiled food and burned debris had begun Friday morning.
Noun
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At the time, certain teams wore BLM patches and stenciled the BLM logo onto the pitcher’s mounds.
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Regular mowing can also disrupt ant mounds.
Noun
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Most companies in the space are selling expensive diagnostics and supplement stacks to wealthy early adopters.
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Only select Archives employees are permitted to go into those stacks; one staffer suggested to me that this is because anyone can disappear in there, sucked down rabbit holes, if there are no guardrails.
Noun
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As one of Montana’s longest standing dude ranches, the property is constantly reimagining through refined design, a wildly impressive staff, and heaps of annual events bringing loads of travelers, from local to first-time ranchers alike.
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Archaeologists have been cataloging dump sites since at least the early 19th century, when Danish scientists began pawing through heaps of mollusk shells that had been discarded by their Stone Age ancestors.
Cite this Entry
“Cairns.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/cairns. Accessed 27 Jun. 2026.
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