A tor is a rock outcrop forme by weathering, usually found on or near the summit of a hill. In the South West of England, where the term originated, it is also a word used for the hills themselves – particularly the high points of Dartmoor in Devon and Bodmin Moor in Cornwall. The word 'tor' is also used in southern Wales, particularly on the rocky coastlines such as the Vale of Glamorgan and the Gower peninsula; on the Gower one of the sandy beaches near Oxwich Bay is called "Tor Bay" because the beach is framed by a huge outcrop of carboniferous limestone. The term is notable for being, along with crag, one among a mere handful of Celtic loan-words (Cornish tor, Old Welsh twrr, Scots Gaelic tòrr), primarily of a geographic or topographical nature, to be borrowed into vernacular English prior to the modern era. This origin of the word and the very fact it has survived hints at the places' special meaning to the gaelic peoples, often being centres of ritual and beliefs in the mystic and spiritual – a belief which in some cases carries on to today.