Scree

Etymology

From Old Norse "skriða" ("landslide, a sliding"), related to a verb meaning "to slide or creep." The word arrived with Norse settlers in the mountainous north of Britain.

noun · /SKREE/
A mass of loose, broken rock fragments covering a slope at the base of a cliff or mountain.
What it names
The shifting rubble that slides underfoot on mountainsides — treacherous to cross and satisfying to name.
Example
We picked our way down a slope of loose scree.
Related idea
"Scree" usually means the loose rock itself; talus is the term geologists use for the sloping pile it forms — the two are often used interchangeably.