Ben Nevis the summit only to find "fragments of earthen and glass ware, chicken bones, corks, and bits of paper". It was not until 1847 that Ben Nevis was confirmed by the Ordnance Survey as the highest mountain in Britain and Ireland, ahead of its rival Ben Macdhui. The summit observatory was built in the summer of 1883, and would remain in operation for 21 years. The first path to the summit was built at the same time as the observatory and was designed to allow ponies to carry up supplies, with a maximum gradient of one in five. The opening of
Lists of mountains and hills in the British Isles and hills in the British Isles that have a topographical prominence of at least , regardless of absolute height or other merits. As at October 2018, there were 1,552 Marilyns in Great Britain: 1,219 in Scotland, 175 in England, and 158 in Wales (Black Mountain, on the England-Wales border, is counted as being in Wales). There are 454 Marilyns in Ireland (389 in the Republic of Ireland and 66 in Northern Ireland), and 5 on the Isle of Man, bringing the total for the British Isles to 2,011. The list was first compiled in 1992 by Alan Dawson. The name