Cutnorth Cliff

Cutnorth Cliff is a dark, jagged headland on the coast of Gont, near the village where Ged buys a leaky boat before setting out on his sea-quest to hunt the shadow. It is the last point of Gontish land from which the villagers cheer him as he sails away, marking the threshold between his homeland and the perilous unknown.

Location and Setting

Cutnorth Cliff is a dark, jagged headland on the coast of Gont, near the village where Ged buys a leaky boat. The cliff stands above a cove where the fisherman who sells Ged the boat keeps his vessel. The landscape is described as "dark jagged bulk" of Cutnorth Cliff, above which "the snowy fields of the Mountain rose up into cloud." This setting is the last point of Gontish land from which Ged departs on his sea-quest.

Events at Cutnorth Cliff

Ged buys a warped, clinker-built boat from a dour old fisherman in the village near Cutnorth Cliff. He pays for it by laying a spell of sea-safety on the fisherman's own boat, himself, and his son. Ged works on the charm all that night and the next day, then sleeps in the fisherman's hut in a whale-gut hammock. At dawn, he goes down to the cove under Cutnorth Cliff where his new boat lies. He pushes it into the quiet water, and water begins to well softly into it at once. Ged sets straight the warped boards and rotten pegs, working both with tools and incantations, as he had used to do with Pechvarry in Low Torning. The people of the village gather in silence, not too close, to watch his quick hands and listen to his soft voice. When the boat is sealed and sound, he sets up his staff that Ogion had made him for a mast, stays it with spells, and fixes across it a yard of sound wood. Downward from this yard he weaves on the wind's loom a sail of spells, a square sail white as the snows on Gont peak above. Standing by the mast, Ged raises up the magewind lightly. The boat moves out upon the water, turning towards the Armed Cliffs across the great bay. When the silent watching fishermen see that leaky rowboat slip out under sail as quick and neat as a sandpiper taking wing, they raise a cheer, grinning and stamping in the cold wind on the beach. Ged looks back a moment and sees them cheering him on, under the dark jagged bulk of Cutnorth Cliff, above which the snowy fields of the Mountain rise up into cloud.

Narrative Significance

Cutnorth Cliff serves as the final landmark of Gont that Ged sees before he sails out onto the Gontish Sea, setting his course northwestwards to pass north of Oranéa. It is the threshold between his homeland and the perilous unknown of his quest. The cliff's "dark jagged bulk" contrasts with the "snowy fields of the Mountain" above, creating a visual boundary between the familiar, inhabited world and the wild, untamed sea. The villagers' cheer, the last human sound he hears from Gont, underscores the isolation and danger of the journey ahead. The cliff is not mentioned again in the narrative, but its presence marks the point of no return for Ged's hunt.