Mountaineering
5000 BCE to Now
A set of outdoor activities that involves ascending mountains, mountaineering-related activities include traditional outdoor climbing, skiing, and traversing via ferratas that have become sports in their own right.
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Jungfrau, the third highest summit in the Bernese Alps, is first ascended by the brothers Johann Rudolf (1768–1825) and Hieronymus Meyer, sons of Johann Rudolf Meyer (1739–1813), the head of a rich merchant family of Aarau.
With several servants and a porter picked up at Guttannen, having reached the Valais by way of the Grimsel, the climbing party had crossed the Beich Pass, a glacier pass over the Oberaletsch Glacier, to the head of the Lötschen valley.
There they had added two local chamois hunters, Alois Volken and Joseph Bortis, to their party and traversed the Lötschenlücke before reaching the Aletschfirn (the west branch of the Aletsch Glacier), where they established the base camp, north of the Aletschhorn.
After the Guttannen porter was sent back alone over the Lötschenlücke, the party finally reaches the summit of the Jungfrau by the Rottalsattel on August 3.
They then recross the two passes named to their point of departure in Valais, and go home again over the Grimsel.
It will not be until 1865 that a more direct route on the northern side is opened.
With several servants and a porter picked up at Guttannen, having reached the Valais by way of the Grimsel, the climbing party had crossed the Beich Pass, a glacier pass over the Oberaletsch Glacier, to the head of the Lötschen valley.
There they had added two local chamois hunters, Alois Volken and Joseph Bortis, to their party and traversed the Lötschenlücke before reaching the Aletschfirn (the west branch of the Aletsch Glacier), where they established the base camp, north of the Aletschhorn.
After the Guttannen porter was sent back alone over the Lötschenlücke, the party finally reaches the summit of the Jungfrau by the Rottalsattel on August 3.
They then recross the two passes named to their point of departure in Valais, and go home again over the Grimsel.
It will not be until 1865 that a more direct route on the northern side is opened.
The first ascent of Finsteraarhorn, the highest summit of the Bernese Alps, is long controversial.
The first attempt had been made on August 16, 1812, by the Aargau merchant Rudolph Meyer, guided by the locals Kaspar Huber, Arnold Abbühl, Joseph Bortes and Aloys Volker.
Bortes and Volker, guiding Meyer's father and uncle, had been the first to climb the Jungfrau the previous year.
They approached the mountain via the Oberaarjoch, Studer glacier, and south-east ridge, which is a more difficult and longer route than the current normal route over the north-west ridge.
Meyer became exhausted and remained behind after reaching the ridge, perhaps near P. 3883 (Meyer's Peak).
Huber kept him company, while the three other guides went on and purportedly reached the summit after three hours.
On August 19, 1828, Franz Joseph Hugi, a geologist from Solothurn, had made another attempt with seven local climbers.
Among these was Arnold Abbühl, who told Hugi about his ascent sixteen years earlier, but Hugi scoffingly dismissed his account, partly because Abbühl had misidentified the peak in the beginning of their approach.
The group had reached a 4,080-metre (13,390-foot) saddle (the Hugisattel) on the north-west ridge, but had to retreat because of bad weather after Hugi and one of the guides (Arnold Dändler) nearly fell off the ridge.
The next year Hugi organizes another expedition via the same route.
While an attempt on the 3rd of August had faltered, on August 10, 1829, two of his guides, Jakob Leuthold and Johann Währen, are able to reach the summit, where they spend three hours building a seven-foot pyramid to anchor a flagpole.
Hugi stays behind somewhat above the saddle not daring to cross a steep slope, partly because he had twisted an ankle four weeks earlier.
On the way back Hugi's ankle plays up and Leuthold, Währen and Joseph Zemt take turns carrying him down the glacier.
Hugi's account makes no mention of evidence of an earlier ascent.
The first attempt had been made on August 16, 1812, by the Aargau merchant Rudolph Meyer, guided by the locals Kaspar Huber, Arnold Abbühl, Joseph Bortes and Aloys Volker.
Bortes and Volker, guiding Meyer's father and uncle, had been the first to climb the Jungfrau the previous year.
They approached the mountain via the Oberaarjoch, Studer glacier, and south-east ridge, which is a more difficult and longer route than the current normal route over the north-west ridge.
Meyer became exhausted and remained behind after reaching the ridge, perhaps near P. 3883 (Meyer's Peak).
Huber kept him company, while the three other guides went on and purportedly reached the summit after three hours.
On August 19, 1828, Franz Joseph Hugi, a geologist from Solothurn, had made another attempt with seven local climbers.
Among these was Arnold Abbühl, who told Hugi about his ascent sixteen years earlier, but Hugi scoffingly dismissed his account, partly because Abbühl had misidentified the peak in the beginning of their approach.
The group had reached a 4,080-metre (13,390-foot) saddle (the Hugisattel) on the north-west ridge, but had to retreat because of bad weather after Hugi and one of the guides (Arnold Dändler) nearly fell off the ridge.
The next year Hugi organizes another expedition via the same route.
While an attempt on the 3rd of August had faltered, on August 10, 1829, two of his guides, Jakob Leuthold and Johann Währen, are able to reach the summit, where they spend three hours building a seven-foot pyramid to anchor a flagpole.
Hugi stays behind somewhat above the saddle not daring to cross a steep slope, partly because he had twisted an ankle four weeks earlier.
On the way back Hugi's ankle plays up and Leuthold, Währen and Joseph Zemt take turns carrying him down the glacier.
Hugi's account makes no mention of evidence of an earlier ascent.
Piz Bernina, the highest summit of the eastern Alps, is first ascended on September 13, 1850, by the twenty-eight-year-old topographer Johann Wilhelm Coaz and his assistants, the brothers Jon and Lorenz Ragut Tscharner.
English lawyer Alfred Wills and party had set out for an ascent of the Wetterhorn in Switzerland on August 27, 1854.
The Wetterhorn summit was first reached on August 31, 1844, by the Grindelwald guides Hans Jaun and Melchior Bannholzer, three days after they had co-guided a large party organized by the geologist Édouard Desor to the first ascent of the Rosenhorn.
The Mittelhorn was first summited on July 9, 1845 by the same guides, this time accompanied by a third, Kaspar Abplanalp, and by British climber Stanhope Templeman Speer.
The son of a Scottish physician, Speer lives in Interlaken, Switzerland.
The September 1854 summit by the party that includes Alfred Wills, who apparently believes he's made the first ascent, will be much celebrated in Great Britain.
Wills' description of this trip in his book "Wanderings Among the High Alps" (published in 1856) will help make mountaineering fashionable in Britain and usher in the so-called "golden age of alpinism", the systematic exploration of the Alps by British mountaineers.
Monte Rosa, the second highest summit in the Alps, is first ascended on August 1, 1855.
Monte Rosa had been studied by pioneering geologists and explorers, including Leonardo da Vinci in the late fifteenth century and Horace-Bénédict de Saussure in the late eighteenth century.
Following a long series of attempts beginning in the early nineteenth century, Monte Rosa's summit,at this time still called Höchste Spitze (English: Highest Peak), is first reached in 1855 from Zermatt by a party of eight climbers led by three guides.
Monte Rosa had been studied by pioneering geologists and explorers, including Leonardo da Vinci in the late fifteenth century and Horace-Bénédict de Saussure in the late eighteenth century.
Following a long series of attempts beginning in the early nineteenth century, Monte Rosa's summit,at this time still called Höchste Spitze (English: Highest Peak), is first reached in 1855 from Zermatt by a party of eight climbers led by three guides.
The Eiger is first ascended on August 11, 1858.
A 3,967-meter (13,015 foot) mountain of the Bernese Alps, overlooking Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen in the Bernese Oberland of Switzerland, just north of the main watershed and border with Valais, the Eiger is the easternmost peak of a ridge crest that extends across the Mönch to the Jungfrau at 4,158 m (13,642 ft), constituting one of the most emblematic sights of the Swiss Alps.
A 3,967-meter (13,015 foot) mountain of the Bernese Alps, overlooking Grindelwald and Lauterbrunnen in the Bernese Oberland of Switzerland, just north of the main watershed and border with Valais, the Eiger is the easternmost peak of a ridge crest that extends across the Mönch to the Jungfrau at 4,158 m (13,642 ft), constituting one of the most emblematic sights of the Swiss Alps.
Dom, the third highest summit in the Alps, is first ascended on September 11, 1858.
Aletschhorn, the second summit of the Bernese Alps, is first ascended on June 18, 1859, almost fifty years after the first ascent of the Jungfrau.
When the Jungfrau was first climbed, the climbers used base camps on the Aletschfirn, at the foot of the Aletschhorn.
The Aletschhorn is climbed first in 1859 by Francis Fox Tuckett, J. J. Bennen, V. Tairraz and P. Bohren.
The party had passed the night in some holes in the rocks above the Mittel Aletsch Glacier (on the east side of the mountain), and on the following morning, on June 18, start the ascent and reach the snow arête connecting the Dreieckhorn with the main peak.
The passage along this arête at so early period of the year, before the snow has become well consolidated, involves some risk and a slope of névé lying at an angle of 50°, requires care and good step-cutting, but the summit can be reached without too much difficulty.
Like many other climbers, Tuckett has taken with him a barometer and makes scientific observations.
He notes the icy temperature and the very strong wind, blowing the snow and threatening to knock over the climbers.
After they reach the summit, Tuckett separates from Bennen and descends via the north face with Bohren and Tairraz.
He wants to descend directly to the Lötschental, but soon after they begin the descent, an avalanche starts right under the feet of the climbers.
They cautiously go back and descend on the Mittelaletsch.
When the Jungfrau was first climbed, the climbers used base camps on the Aletschfirn, at the foot of the Aletschhorn.
The Aletschhorn is climbed first in 1859 by Francis Fox Tuckett, J. J. Bennen, V. Tairraz and P. Bohren.
The party had passed the night in some holes in the rocks above the Mittel Aletsch Glacier (on the east side of the mountain), and on the following morning, on June 18, start the ascent and reach the snow arête connecting the Dreieckhorn with the main peak.
The passage along this arête at so early period of the year, before the snow has become well consolidated, involves some risk and a slope of névé lying at an angle of 50°, requires care and good step-cutting, but the summit can be reached without too much difficulty.
Like many other climbers, Tuckett has taken with him a barometer and makes scientific observations.
He notes the icy temperature and the very strong wind, blowing the snow and threatening to knock over the climbers.
After they reach the summit, Tuckett separates from Bennen and descends via the north face with Bohren and Tairraz.
He wants to descend directly to the Lötschental, but soon after they begin the descent, an avalanche starts right under the feet of the climbers.
They cautiously go back and descend on the Mittelaletsch.
Grand Combin, one of the highest summits in the Alps, is first ascended on July 30, 1859.
The Grand Combin, which yields in height to only a few European mountains, has long been one of the least known of Alpine summits.
The first to commence the exploration of the great massif that separates the Val de Bagnes from the Val d'Entremont was Gottlieb Samuel Studer, of Berne, who on August 14, 1851 reached for the first time the summit of the Combin de Corbassière with the guide Joseph-Benjamin Fellay, and has published an account of that and a subsequent excursion in Bergund Gletscher-Fahrten.
He was followed in that ascent five years later by W. and C. E. Mathews, and in 1857, William Mathews anticipated Studer in the ascent of the second peak of the Grand Combin.
The first four expeditions on Grand Combin reached only the minor summit east of Grand Combin (Aiguille du Croissant).
The first one was made by mountain guides from the valley (Maurice Fellay and Jouvence Bruchez) on July 20, 1857.
The first complete ascent of Grand Combin is finally made on July 30, 1859 by Charles Sainte-Claire Deville with Daniel, Emmanuel and Gaspard Balleys, and Basile Dorsaz.
The Grand Combin, which yields in height to only a few European mountains, has long been one of the least known of Alpine summits.
The first to commence the exploration of the great massif that separates the Val de Bagnes from the Val d'Entremont was Gottlieb Samuel Studer, of Berne, who on August 14, 1851 reached for the first time the summit of the Combin de Corbassière with the guide Joseph-Benjamin Fellay, and has published an account of that and a subsequent excursion in Bergund Gletscher-Fahrten.
He was followed in that ascent five years later by W. and C. E. Mathews, and in 1857, William Mathews anticipated Studer in the ascent of the second peak of the Grand Combin.
The first four expeditions on Grand Combin reached only the minor summit east of Grand Combin (Aiguille du Croissant).
The first one was made by mountain guides from the valley (Maurice Fellay and Jouvence Bruchez) on July 20, 1857.
The first complete ascent of Grand Combin is finally made on July 30, 1859 by Charles Sainte-Claire Deville with Daniel, Emmanuel and Gaspard Balleys, and Basile Dorsaz.
Weisshorn, the fifth highest summit in the Alps, is first ascended by the twenty-nine-year-old physicist John Tyndall, with guides J. J. Bennen and Ulrich Wenger, on August 19, 1861.
Their itinerary corresponds to the normal route for climbing the mountain today: the east ridge, starting from the Weisshorn Hut.
Their itinerary corresponds to the normal route for climbing the mountain today: the east ridge, starting from the Weisshorn Hut.
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