EUROPE

THE ULTRAS PAGE

108 Summits with prominence of 1,500 meters (4,921 ft.) or greater

LISTINGS

Because people have legitimate differences of opinion as to what constitutes Europe (as distinct from Asia and from Oceania), peaks have been placed on one of three lists:

"Core Europe" - constituting 99 peaks in Mainland Europe west of the Volga River and including the Mediterranean Islands.
"Europe: Atlantic Islands" - constituting nine high points of islands in the North Atlantic and Arctic that are commonly associated with Europe.
"European Russia and the Caucasus" - constituting two summits on the Eurasian divide, and summits in both the Russian Caucasus and the Caucasian states.

It is felt therefore that hikers desiring to work on hiking the European ultra-prominences may content themselves with the "Core Europe" list, or may choose to draw inspiration from the two auxiliary lists.

MAPS

Two large .gif files have been prepared that show the location of Core European summits.
Beware of long download times.
Map 1    The European Peninsula, including Mediterranean Islands. (472 kb)
Map 2    Scandinavia. (152 kb)

On the map, each ultra-prominence is identified by a number, representing its relative rank. Names and provisional prominence values appear at the bottom of the page.

Large red triangles represent peaks with 610-1,499 meters prominence (2,000-4,921 ft). Small red triangles represent peaks with 305-609 meters (1,000-1,999 ft) prominence. These peaks are as yet unnamed in the listings, and subject to further map verification.

SUMMARY OF DATA

If you thought all of the high prominences in Europe were in the Alps and Pyrenees, you are more than half wrong! The Alps acheive 44 ultra-prominences of the 98 on the Core Europe list. The Pyrenees, only one! The real surprise is the number of ultras in Greece and the Southern Balkans. It is also interesting to note that there are comparatively few ultras along the central divide of the Alps. There are a greater number in the foothills both to the North (Alpstein, Northern Austria) and South (in Northern Italy.)

For those who prefer to categorize summits by country, the following table should inform. Four summits sit on an international boundary. Cyprus has been added to this list, although geographically speaking it really should be on an Asia Minor list.

Nation              # in        # on
                 Core Europe   Atlantic Is.

Albania               6
Austria              13
Bulgaria              4
Cyprus                1
France                9
Germany               1
Greece               18
Iceland               0           1
Italy                21
F.Y. Macedonia        4
Norway                4           2
Portugal              0           2
Romania               4
Slovakia              1
Slovenia              2
Spain                 4           4
Sweden                2
Switzerland           8
Ukraine               1

There are two borderline P1500m summits in Serbia/Montenegro which are at present not included on the list or map. In both cases, inclusion of the peak is pending reconciliation of discrepancies between SRTM data and 1:50,000 DMA mapping.

PROMINENCE DATA
(lists and maps)

WORLD ULTRAS
HOMEPAGE

PROMINENCE
THEORY
(orometry)

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