The Highlands of Scotland form part of the northern periphery of Europe, an area which extends in an arc from Ireland in the west, through northern Scandinavia, to arctic Russia. The periphery is distinguished from the rest of the continent by its cool climate, its difficult soil, its proximity to the sea, its sparsity of population, its culture, and its ethnic composition. Distance from cities and from centres of industry and government gives a special character to its societies. They are Europe's most isolated and most individual peoples.

There are around 330,000 inhabitants in the seven ‘crofting counties’ of Scotland, and 353,000 in the area covered by the Highlands and Islands Development Board. They live in an area of over fourteen million square miles, at a density of around twenty people to the square mile. Although 40% live in towns, the largest of these is Inverness (population c. 40,000) and the next in size are Dunoon (c. 10,000) and Thurso (c. 10,000). There are only eight other towns with over 4,000 people (these figures are approximate, since the new local government Districts are larger than the old towns, and the latter are not now enumerated separately). The Highlands contain 7% of the population of Scotland and 47% of its area (16% of the area of Great Britain).