Kanchenjunga
From Arthur Ransome Wiki
Kanchenjunga is a mountain to the north-west of the Lake which features most prominently in Swallowdale. It is known to have a native name, but Titty insists that the Swallows and the Amazons use her chosen name. The Amazons' parents knew the mountain and called it the Matterhorn.
The Swallows and Amazons climb to the summit cairn on 11 August 1931 (SD28) and find a cached inscription from the Amazons' parents (SD28):
- August the 2nd. 1901.
- We climbed the Matterhorn.
- "That's mother and Uncle Jim," said Peggy in a queer voice.
- "Who is Bob Blackett?" asked Susan
- "He was father." said Nancy.
- Nobody said anything for a minute... Peggy wonders how Molly & Jim escaped from the GA.
Christina Hardyment points out that the inscription in the cairn emphasises that "the stories mix together the experiences of at least three generations of Coniston families." (CFT5)
The children all add their names to the inscription and put it back, adding:
- Aug. 11 1931.
- We climbed Kanchenjunga.
There is a Victorian farthing in the box, which is for Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee, 1897. Nancy wishes they had a George the fifth farthing, but they add a new halfpenny that Roger is carrying (!).
Nancy tells Roger:
- "You put it back, and then perhaps in another thirty years...
- She broke off, but presently laughed.
Titty says:
- They meant it to stay for a thousand years ..... now perhaps it won't be found for ages and ages till people wear quite different sorts of clothes ... I wonder how big Captain Flint was then.
In Winter Holiday, Molly Blackett says You might take a run up the Matterhorn - Kanchenjunga, I mean ... (WH6).
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[edit] Native prototypes
[edit] The Old man of Coniston
Kanchenjunga is based on The Old Man of Coniston in the Lake District. Titty often refers to Kanchenjunga as he or him, possibly alluding to the mountain's manly status.
[edit] Kangchenjunga
Kangchenjunga (note the modern accepted spelling) is the third highest mountain in the world (after Mount Everest and K2), with an altitude of 8,586 metres. This mountain was very much in the news when the Swallows made their first visits to the Lake:
- 1929 A German expedition led by Paul Bauer reached 7,400 m (24,280 ft) on the northeast spur before being turned back by a five-day storm.
- 1930 An International Expedition led by George Dyhrenfurth, German Uli Wieland, Austrian Erwin Schneider and Englishman Frank Smythe (who published "The Kangchenjunga Adventure" in the same year). The attempt failed due to poor weather and snow conditions.
- 1931 A second German expedition, led again by Paul Bauer, attempted the northeast spur before being turned back by bad weather, illnesses, and deaths. The expedition retreats after climbing only a little higher than the 1929 attempt.
Kangchenjunga was eventually climbed in 1955, The British expedition honoured the beliefs of the Sikkimese, who hold the summit sacred, by stopping a few feet short of the actual summit; an attitude parallelled by Susan in preventing Roger from scaling the cairn on their Kanchenjunga.
[edit] Matterhorn
The Matterhorn or Cervino (Italian), Mont Cervin or Le Cervin (French) is perhaps the most familiar mountain in the European Alps, on the Italian/Swiss border, and first climbed in 1865. Coincidentally, Matterhorn's difficult North Face route was first ascended on July 31–August 1, 1931, just days before the Swallows and Amazons repeated the achievement of the Amazons' parents and uncle.
