Everest

Introduction

Mount Everest, Earth’s highest mountain above sea level, located in the Mahalangur Himal sub-range of the Himalayas. The China–Nepal border also runs across its summit point. Its elevation (snow height) of 8,848.86 m (29,031 ft 8+1⁄2 in) most recently established in 2020 by the Chinese and Nepali authorities.

Mount Everest attracts many climbers, including highly experienced mountaineers. There are two main climbing routes, one approaching the summit from the southeast in Nepal (known as the “standard route”) and the other from the north in Tibet. While not posing substantial technical climbing challenges on the standard route, Everest presents dangers such as altitude sickness, weather, and wind, as well as hazards from avalanches and the Khumbu Icefall. As of November 2022, 310 people have died on Everest. Over 200 bodies remain on the mountain and have not been removed due to the dangerous conditions.^[7][8]

Name

Mount Everest’s Nepali/Sanskrit name is Sagarmāthā (IAST transcription) or Sagar-Matha^[10] (सगर-माथा, [sʌɡʌrmatʰa], lit. “goddess of the sky”^[11]),^[12] which means “the head in the great blue sky”, derived from सगर (sagar), meaning “sky”, and माथा (māthā), meaning “head”.^[13]

The Tibetan name for Everest is Qomolangma (ཇོ་མོ་གླང་མ, lit. “holy mother”). The name first recorded (in a Chinese transcription) in the 1721 Kangxi Atlas, issued during the reign of Qing Emperor Kangxi; it first appeared in the West in 1733 as Tchoumour Lancma, on a map prepared by the French geographer D’Anville and based on Kangxi Atlas.^[14] The Tibetan name also popularly romanised as Chomolungma and (in Wylie) as Jo-mo-glang-ma.^[19]

The official Chinese transcription is 珠穆朗玛峰 (t 珠穆朗瑪峰), or Zhūmùlǎngmǎ Fēng in pinyin. While other Chinese names have been used historically, including Shèngmǔ Fēng (t 聖母峰, s 圣母峰, lit. “holy mother peak”), these names largely phased out after the Chinese Ministry of Internal Affairs issued a decree to adopt a sole name in May 1952.^[20]

Everest himself opposed the honor, and told the Royal Geographical Society in 1857 that “Everest” could neither write in Hindi nor pronounce by “the native of India“. Despite Everest’s objections, Waugh’s proposed name prevailed, and the Royal Geographical Society officially adopted the name “Mount Everest” in 1865.^[21][24] The modern pronunciation of Everest (/ˈɛvərɪst/)^[25] is different from Sir George’s pronunciation of his surname (/ˈiːvrɪst/ EEV-rist).^[26]

In the late 19th century, many European cartographers incorrectly believed that a native name for the mountain was Gaurishankar, a mountain between Kathmandu and Everest.