Personal letters written by John Franklin to his relatives and friends between 1819 and 1824 reveal the Admiralty's 1819–1822 overland expedition from a unique perspective. All the official journals of that expedition have been published, as have the most important pieces of correspondence between Franklin and the Admiralty, the Colonial Office, and fur-trade officers. Previously unpublished personal correspondence, however, offers the possibility of a more candid response, as well as an opportunity to view the experience from an altered position. In these personal communications, Franklin sometimes expresses opinions that contradict those that appear in his public narrative and official records. But more importantly, they help construct an image of Franklin's personality around the time of his first overland expedition. The letters reveal a modest man with close familial attachments and a strong sense of personal relationships, in spite of the increasingly technological nature of his subsequent Arctic undertakings.

Opinions are divided as to whether the area of Vestfold Hills was formerly covered by the East Antarctic ice sheet or S0rsdal Glacier. Striae orientations have been used to erect the model of extension of the ice sheet followed by a minor lateral expansion of Sørsdal Glacier, while basal till fabrics; distribution of weathered rock; and the nature, orientation, and distribution of moraines have been used to conclude that lateral expansion of Sørsdal Glacier alone can explain the evidence of the last glaciation of Vestfold Hills. A review of all available data supports the model of regional glaciation by an extended East Antarctic ice sheet. Lateral expansion of Sørsdal Glacier has probably only played a minor role in the glaciation of Vestfold Hills since the regional glaciation.

Variations in multiyear sea-ice backscatter from the synthetic aperture radar (SAR) aboard the ERS-1 satellite are interpreted in terms of melt-season characteristics (onset of melt in spring and of freeze-up in autumn, and the duration of the snow-decay period, the melt season, and the melt-pond season) from late winter to early autumn 1992 in two regions of the Arctic Ocean: the northeastern Beaufort Sea adjacent to the Queen Elizabeth Islands in the Canadian high Arctic and the western Beaufort Sea north of Alaska. In the northeastern Beaufort Sea, the onset of melt occurs later, and the periods of snow-cover decay and the occurrence of melt ponds are shorter than in the western Beaufort Sea. These melt-season characteristics of each area are consistent with previous observations that the northeastern Beaufort Sea has one of the most severe summer climates in the Arctic Ocean. A model, which assumes that the backscatter from multiyear floes is the sum of backscatter from bare ice and melt ponds, is used to derive the melt-pond fraction during the summer. The results show that melt-pond fractions decrease from an early-summer maximum of about 60% to a late-summer minimum around 10%. The magnitude of the melt-pond fractions and their decline during the summer is consistent with previous, more qualitative data. The SAR model, which gives melt-pond fractions with lower variability and less uncertainty than previous data, offers an improved approach to the reliable estimation of the areal extent of water on ice floes. Suggestions for further improvement of the model include accounting for the consequences of wind-speed variations, summer snowfall, and freeze/thaw cycles and their effects on melt-pond and ice-surface roughness.

Prince Gustav Ice Shelf, situated between James Ross Island and Trinity Peninsula at the northern tip of the Antarctic Peninsula, West Antarctica, has retreated rapidly between 1989 and 1995. This paper re-examines historical accounts of the area and plots the position of the ice shelf at various times, from 1843 onwards. These results show that an episode of rapid retreat between 1957 and 1959 preceded the recent rapid retreat, and that the ice shelf has been retreating for most of the period since 1843. The mechanisms underlying the two periods of rapid retreat are considered.

The first recorded wintering on Svalbard occurred in 1630–1631. Eight English whalemen were accidentally left behind for the winter. Having no equipment with which to survive the harsh climate, they sailed and rowed their shallop to Bell Sownd (Bellsund), a fjord south of where they were stranded, to an English whaling station where they found a house in which they survived. The location of this whaling station has never previously been established, but, based on archaeological surveys, test excavations, and the story published by one of the winterers, it has now been located at Laegerneset, on the eastern side of Recherchefjorden.

The eight men's most serious problem was obtaining sufficient food for the winter, and therefore food was rationed carefully. An analysis has been made based on the food stock they had when winter set in. Fresh supplies from hunting during late winter and spring were probably vital in keeping the men healthy. Although they undoubtedly would have been able to manage on the food they had collected during the autumn on a basis strictly of caloric intake, it is debatable whether they would have avoided scurvy without fresh meat during the long winter.

A quarter of the terrestrial Acari recorded from Antarctica and the sub-Antarctic islands are parasitic haematophages or non-feeding phoretics associated with other larger and more mobile animals, especially sea birds and pterygote insects. Although flying sea birds are effective vectors of zoohoric mites into the region, penguins are not and merely serve as reservoir hosts. Similarly, most of the mites associated with insects were accidentally introduced by man as free-living adults that subsequently utilised a range of alien and indigenous insects as local dispersal mechanisms.

The professional artist Edward Seago (1910–1974) travelled to the Antarctic Peninsula, the Falkland Islands, and South Georgia in the 1956/57 austral summer. Although firmly rooted in the English, and in particular the East Anglian, tradition of landscape painting, Seago was able to portray polar landscapes, which he had not previously experienced, with vigour and delight. He went to Antarctica with a firmly established skill in using oils to capture the essence of a landscape, and, despite being on or near the Antarctic Peninsula for only about three days, he produced about 18 oil paintings, predominantly of landscapes and icescapes. In addition, he painted at least a further 17 works of the Falkland Islands, South Georgia, the whaling industry, and icebergs in the Southern Ocean. Seago had an excellent memory and was able to ‘reproduce’ earlier works, an ability that has caused some confusion. Examples of these counterparts are discussed. A catalogue of his known Antarctic works is given.

Controlling visitor impacts in polar regions continues to be important in both the Antarctic and Arctic. Concerns relate to impacts on the physical environment, cultural heritage, and host communities or scientific bases, as well as a recognition that safety and liability are major issues for governments, commercial operators, and local populations. Strategies for controlling tourists include visitor and operator codes and formal legislation. This paper summarises several approaches to visitor regulation in polar regions in order to illustrate the ways in which concerns about tourist impacts are being addressed. Similar issues arise throughout the polar regions, although in some places a particular emphasis might indicate a specific area of concern for a community, region, nation, or segment of the tourism industry. While a comprehensive strategy might be appropriate in many respects in the Arctic, it is also important to acknowledge the significance of more specific concerns. This paper first describes regulation of tourist behaviour and considers general issues of strategy effectiveness. Then it examines the approaches to visitor regulation used in the Antarctic and on S valbard as examples that may be of use in the further development of strategies in the Arctic. The paper then discusses an evolving strategy for control in the Northwest Territories, Canada. This strategy differs from these other approaches in that it targets a specific segment of the visitor population: those undertaking adventure expeditions.

The ship Fox, built in Aberdeen in 1855 as a yacht, was used by Francis Leopold McClintock on his successful search for relics of Sir John Franklin's lost expedition. She was then chartered for one summer for Allen Young and John Rae to survey a route for a trans-Atlantic cable via the Faeroes, Iceland, and Greenland, after which she was in the services of the Kryolith Mine og Handelsselskabet, based at Ivigtut, southwest Greenland, for many years. In 1905, under charter, she made a historically significant voyage to Thule in northwest Greenland. After this she was owned by the Kongelige Grønlanske Handel and used for coastal freighting, until in 1912 she was condemned and abandoned in Qeqertarsuaq (Godhavn) Harbour, where remnants may be seen today.

Since the late 1970s, theorists in the field of international relations have increasingly used the concept ‘international regime’ in their attempts to give content to the idea of international governance. The concept was adopted from international lawyers, and this has led to some confusion when analysts apply terminology differently. Analysis of Antarctic politics is no exception. This article seeks to illustrate how the theory of international regimes can be applied to the Antarctic Treaty System (ATS). The focus is on the events of the 1980s, during which international awareness (or perception) of a global environmental crisis severely tested the robustness of ‘the Antarctic regime’ (that is, the ATS). Three approaches to regime formation and change or transformation are considered in an attempt to explain the rejection of the Convention for the Regulation of Antarctic Mineral Resource Activities and the acceptance of the 1991 Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty. The three approaches employed are game theory, functional theories, and cognitive explanations. The evolution of a new epistemic consensus on the value and the future of the Antarctic crystallises, signifying a key role on the part of natural scientists and environmental non-governmental organisations. It is concluded that the ATS as a whole can today be described as an international environmental regime.

The morphology of seven soil ciliate species from continental Antarctica was investigated using live observation and protargol impregnation. Observations on two populations of Protospathidium serpens corroborate the view that this species usually has a single, more-or-less nodular, macronucleus distinguishing it from P. muscicola, which possesses 10–30 nodules. The Antarctic specimens of Protospathidium terricola differ inconspicuously from the type population in that they are slightly larger, have fewer ciliary rows (17 vs 21), and the fragments of the circumoral kinety are less distinctly separated from each other. Spathidium seppelti nov. spec, resembles 5. bavariense, but has 100–200 macronuclear nodules and a conical depression in the dorsal third of the oral bulge. Odontochlamys wisconsinensis nov. comb, (basionym: Chilodonella wisconsinensis Kahl, 1931) has four right field kineties and an oral basket consisting of 14 rods; the dorsal brush is near the anterior margin and usually consists of four cilia. The Antarctic population of Pseudochilodonopsis mutabilis possesses a regular dorsal hump and only 12–14 (about 15 in Austrian type population) phary ngeal rods. Oxytricha opisthomuscorum has six dorsal kineties with long cilia and a buccal cirrus near the anterior end of the paroral membrane. The Antarctic specimens of Sterkiella histriomuscorum have fïve transverse cirri. Their morphogenesis differs slightly from that of a population having four transverse cirri in that the daughter's anlagen are more distinctly separated and some temporal sequences are different.

Concentrations of calcium and phosphorus were measured in the neonatal dentine of 11 crabeater and 11 Weddell seal postcanine teeth with an energy-dispersive x-ray analyser. The extent of variation in elemental concentrations in different parts of the tooth, differences between species and individuals, and whether variation in elemental concentrations can provide information about dentine deposition mechanisms were assessed. No consistent patterns in elemental deposition in different parts of the tooth were found, but there were differences in concentrations between and within species. Post-natal dentine is composed of layers that appear alternately bright and dark in backscattered electron images. The elemental composition of neonatal dentine was closer to the dark bands than to those that appeared bright. It is suggested that the composition of neonatal dentine is more similar to the dark than the bright layers of dentine because of nutritional stresses that were occurring during mineral deposition.

This paper presents the results of a radiocarbon dating study of snow petrel (Pagodroma nivea) nest sites in central Dronning Maud Land, Antarctica. Mumiyo (a sub-fossilized accumulation of regurgitated proventricular oil) samples were collected from 15 snow petrel nest sites at nunataks in the northern Ahlmannryggen, Gjelsvikfjella, and Mühlig-Hofmannfjella.

Radiocarbon dating revealed Holocene ages of ca 8500 years and less for all but one of these mumiyo samples. A sample collected at S varthamaren in the Muhlig-Hofmannfjella was dated as old as ca 34,000 a BP, indicating that at least some areas of that mountain escaped the scouring action of glaciers during the last glacial period. Similar pre-Holocene ages have been determined for a small number of mumiyo samples in previous studies. Mumiyo accumulations from some nests indicate periods of occupation as long as 6000 years, whereas the radiocarbon age and volume of other mumiyo samples suggest short periods of frequent nesting activity. As expected, sub-samples extracted from the lower layers of mumiyo pieces generally displayed greater ages than sub-samples from upper layers of the same piece. However, there was no clear-cut correlation between the age of a mumiyo sample and its height above the present ice level. It is suspected that this lack of correlation is due to some of the mumiyo samples being displaced previously through rockfalls.

This brief analysis of the life and personal outlook of one of the officers on Sir John Franklin's Northwest Passage expedition (1845–1848) begins a long-overdue process of reconstructing the background, attitudes, and motivation of those serving on Erebus and Terror. A great deal of recent research and speculation has considered the reasons behind the failures of Franklin's last expedition, but, although forensic science may prove useful in helping to discover what happened to Captain Crozier and his companions, it is equally important to understand those men's beliefs while they lived. This article looks at the career and religious background of John Irving, the Third Officer of HMS Terror.

Each Antarctic Treaty Consultative Party established its national Antarctic operating agency in circumstances that were unique to itself. For some of the original members of the Antarctic Treaty, the initial organisations have continued to act as their national Antarctic operators. New members have either delegated responsibility to existing government organisations or have established new bodies to implement their national Antarctic programmes. The organisations selected to assume responsibility for operating the individual national Antarctic programmes, although varied, possess similar attributes and fall into four categories. Thedistinguishing features of these categories are based on the extent of the functions and financial responsibilities adopted by the agencies. By establishing their nature, this study offers a framework for analysis and a basis for further research on the styles and trends in organising national Antarctic programmes.

Karl Ernst von Baer coined the word ‘Eiskeller’ (ice-cellar) to describe the Kara Sea in 1837, but he did not define precisely what he meant. The word was seized upon by subsequent geographers, notably Friedrich B. Lütke and August Petermann, as implying that the sea was unnavigable. However, when numerous successful voyages — by Norwegian fishermen, Joseph Wiggins, and Adolf Erik Nordenskiöld — showed that this was not the case, it was Baer, and not Lütke or Petermann, who was criticised for the claim. Baer only defended himself against these allegations in 1876, the year of his death, 39 years after he had first used the term.