Cairns

//kɛənz// name, noun

name, noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    plural of cairn form-of, plural
Proper Noun
  1. 1
    A surname.
  2. 2
    A city and port in Queensland, Australia, named after William Cairns.
  3. 3
    A local government area in northern Queensland; in full, the Cairns Region.

Synonyms

All synonyms
archbarrowbench markbookmarkboundary stonebrass

Example

More examples

"Our wagonette had topped a rise and in front of us rose the huge expanse of the moor, mottled with gnarled and craggy cairns and tors. A cold wind swept down from it and set us shivering."

Etymology

* As a Scottish surname, from Scots cairn, describing a manmade heap or mound of stones. * As an Irish surname, from Ó Ciaráin, Anglicized as Kieran and Kearns, sometimes conflated with the Scottish above.

Related phrases

Cairns Bay

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.