Mount Athelstan is a prominent, partly ice-covered

mountain A mountain is an elevated portion of the Earth's crust, generally with steep sides that show significant exposed bedrock. Although definitions vary, a mountain may differ from a plateau in having a limited summit area, and is usually higher t ...

, high, at the north side of Trench Glacier on a spur which extends east from

Douglas Range The Douglas Range () is a sharp-crested range, with peaks rising to 3,000 metres, extending 120 km (75 mi) in a northwest–southeast direction from Mount Nicholas to Mount Edred and forming a steep east escarpment of Alexander Island ...

on the east coast of

Alexander Island Alexander Island, which is also known as Alexander I Island, Alexander I Land, Alexander Land, Alexander I Archipelago, and Zemlja Alexandra I, is the largest island of Antarctica. It lies in the Bellingshausen Sea west of Palmer Land, Antar ...

Antarctica Antarctica () is Earth's southernmost and least-populated continent. Situated almost entirely south of the Antarctic Circle and surrounded by the Southern Ocean, it contains the geographic South Pole. Antarctica is the fifth-largest co ...

. The east side of Douglas Range was first photographed from the air on 23 November 1935, by Lincoln Ellsworth, and Mount Athelstan was mapped from the photos by

W.L.G. Joerg Wolfgang Louis Gottfried Joerg, better known as W. L. G. Joerg (February 6, 1885 – January 7, 1952) was an American geographer, and in particular an expert in the geography of the Arctic and Antarctic regions, who exercised broad influence on the ...

. It was roughly surveyed in 1936 by the British Graham Land Expedition under John Riddoch Rymill, and re-surveyed in 1948 and 1949 by the

Falkland Islands Dependencies Survey The British Antarctic Survey (BAS) is the United Kingdom's national polar research institute. It has a dual purpose, to conduct polar science, enabling better understanding of global issues, and to provide an active presence in the Antarctic on ...

, and named by them for

Æthelstan Æthelstan or Athelstan (; ang, Æðelstān ; on, Aðalsteinn; ; – 27 October 939) was List of monarchs of Wessex, King of the Anglo-Saxons from 924 to 927 and List of English monarchs, King of the English from 927 to his death in 939. ...

Saxon The Saxons ( la, Saxones, german: Sachsen, ang, Seaxan, osx, Sahson, nds, Sassen, nl, Saksen) were a group of Germanic * * * * peoples whose name was given in the early Middle Ages to a large country ( Old Saxony, la, Saxonia) near the No ...

king of England The monarchy of the United Kingdom, commonly referred to as the British monarchy, is the constitutional form of government by which a hereditary sovereign reigns as the head of state of the United Kingdom, the Crown Dependencies (the Baili ...

, 924–937.

References

Mountains of Alexander Island {{AlexanderIsland-geo-stub