Monte Rosa is a mountain massif in the eastern part of the Pennine Alps, on the border between Italy (Piedmont and Aosta Valley) and Switzerland (Valais). The highest peak of the massif, amongst several peaks of over 4,000 m (13,000 ft), is the Dufourspitze (4,634 m, 15,203 ft), the second highest mountain in the Alps and western Europe, after Mont Blanc.
The group is on the watershed between the Rhône and Po basins and has a topographic prominence of 2,165 metres (7,103 ft), which is ranked fifth in the Alps.
The Monte Rosa massif has four faces: the Liskamm heading above the Val de Gressoney; the Valsesian face above Alagna Valsesia at the upper part of the Valle della Sesia; the east wall above Macugnaga in the Valle Anzasca; and the north-western flowing towards the Mattertal with Zermatt, which has one of the largest Alpine glaciers.
Its main summit, named Dufourspitze in honor of the surveyor Guillaume-Henri Dufour and wholly located in Switzerland, culminates at 4,634 m (15,203 ft) and is followed by the five nearly equally high subsidiary summits of Dunantspitze, Grenzgipfel, Nordend, Zumsteinspitze, and Signalkuppe. Some other peaks over 4,000 m (13,000 ft), such as Piramide Vincent, Punta Giordani, and Corno Nero, are wholly in Italy. Monte Rosa is the highest mountain in both Switzerland and the Pennine Alps and is also the second-highest mountain in the Alps and in Europe outside of the Caucasus.
The north-west side of the central Monte Rosa massif, with its enormous ice slopes and seracs, constitutes the boundary and upper basin of the large Gorner Glacier, which descends towards Zermatt and merges with its nowadays much larger tributary, the Grenzgletscher (lit. 'Border Glacier'), right below the Monte Rosa Hut on the lower end of the visible western wing. The Grenzgletscher is an impressive glacier formation between the western wing of the mountain and Liskamm, a ridge on its southwestern side on the Swiss-Italian border. On the eastern side, in Italy, the mountain falls away in an almost vertical 2,400-metre-high (7,900 ft) wall of granite and ice, the biggest in Europe, overlooking Macugnaga and several smaller glaciers.
Monte Rosa was studied by pioneering geologists and explorers, including Leonardo da Vinci in the late fifteenth century and Horace-Bénédict de Saussure in the late eighteenth century. Following a long series of attempts beginning in the early nineteenth century, Monte Rosa's summit, then still called Höchste Spitze (lit. 'highest peak'), was first reached in 1855 from Zermatt by a party of eight climbers led by three guides. The great east wall was first climbed in 1872, from Macugnaga by Richard Pendlebury with his brother, W. M. Pendlebury, Rev. C Taylor and the guide Ferdinand Imseng.
Each summer, many climbers set out from the Monte Rosa Hut on the mountain's west wing for one of its summits via the normal route or for the Margherita Hut on the Signalkuppe (Italian: Punta Gnifetti), used as a research station. Many tourists and hikers also come to the Gornergrat on the northwest side of the massif to see a panorama that extends over some of the highest peaks in the Alps.
Although Italian rosa and French rose both mean 'pink' or 'rose', the name is unrelated to these words and is instead derived from the Franco-Provençal Valdôtain patois word rouése 'glacier'. On old maps as late as 1740, the mountain was named Monte Bosa and even Monte Biosa by the inhabitants of Val Sesia. The name Mon Boso, which appears in Leonardo da Vinci's notebooks, very likely designates the same mountain. From Zermatt the mountain was formerly known under the name Gornerhorn (lit. 'large/strong horn') in Walliser German, later shortened to de Gorner. In standard German, the name Gorner is still used for the western ridge protruding from the main mass (Gornergrat) and the glacier that lies at its foot (Gornergletscher) but not used for the mountain itself anymore. Nowadays, in German, the Italian name Monte Rosa is used instead (Monte Rosa-Gletscher, Monte Rosa-Hütte, etc.).
Geographic setting and description
Monte Rosa covers areas on both sides of the border between the Swiss canton of Valais and the Italian regions of Piedmont and Aosta Valley. The main summit of Monte Rosa is the Dufourspitze. On the Swiss side the town centre of Zermatt is about 13 km (8.1 mi) north-west and 3,000 m (9,800 ft) below it. On the Italian side of the massif are located 9 km (5.6 mi) north-east Macugnaga in the Valle Anzasca,11 km (6.8 mi) south-east-south Alagna Valsesia in the Valsesia and 13 km (8.1 mi) Gressoney-La-Trinité in the Val de Gressoney, respectively, away from the summit. The different sides of the mountain greatly differ from each other. The Swiss west side is almost completely covered by large glaciers, tributaries of the 57 km2 (22 sq mi) large Gorner Glacier, descending progressively with gentle slopes and forming a large uninhabited glacial valley. The Italian east side consists of a 2,400-metre-high (7,900 ft) wall overlooking Macugnaga, whose snows feed the Belvedere Glacier at its base. The southeast face, culminating at the Signalkuppe, overlooks the piedmontese Valsesia and the Val de Gressoney in the autonomous region of Aosta Valley.
The mountain is mainly covered by eternal snows and glaciers, except for its summit which is a rocky ridge orientated west–east, near to and perpendicular to the main watershed between Switzerland and Italy (the river basins of the Rhône and the Po on the Swiss and Italian side, respectively). The connecting point between them is the Grenzgipfel (English: Border Summit) right on the border, and therefore also the highest peak on the Italian side. Thus, Monte Rosa is the highest mountain in the Alps whose summit is not on the main alpine watershed, although it is off by only 150 metres (490 ft). The Silbersattel (English: Silver Saddle) and Grenzsattel (English: Border Saddle) are the passes located north and south to the summit. The three main secondary summits of Monte Rosa are (from north to south): the Nordend (4,609 m, 15,121 ft; north of the Dufourspitze), the Zumsteinspitze (4,563 m, 14,970 ft; south of the Dufourspitze) and the Signalkuppe (4,554 m, 14,941 ft; Italian: Punta Gnifetti), all of them being positioned right on the Swiss-Italian border. Other secondary summits are the Parrotspitze (4,432 m, 14,541 ft), the Ludwigshöhe (4,431 m, 14,537 ft) and the Vincentpiramid (4,215 m, 13,829 ft). All of them originally have German names, since even the Italian valleys used to be inhabited by German-based Walsers inhabited valleys.
Several perpendicular secondary ridges are connected to the central massif, dividing the glaciers that descend towards the Matter Valley. The ridge called Weissgrat connecting the Nordend with the Schwarzberghorn (Italian: Corno Nero) presents a wall of formidable precipices towards the east, but falls away in a gentle slope to the west. For a breadth of a few kilometres the upper snow-fields of the Weissgrat lie almost unbroken upon this slope, but as they begin to descend towards the Matter Valley they are divided into two ice streams (the upper Gorner Glacier and the Findel Glacier) by a ridge which gradually emerges from the névé, and finally presents a rather bold front to the glaciers on either side. The highest points of this ridge, appearing insignificant by contrast with the grand objects around, are the Stockhorn (3,532 m, 11,588 ft) and the lower Gornergrat at 3,090 m (10,138 ft). On their south sides is the lower Gorner Glacier, formed by the confluence of all the major (Gornergletscher and Grenzgletscher) and minor tributaries descending from the north, west and south sides of the central Monte Rosa massif, while on the north side, the Findel Glacier descends near the hamlet of Findeln.
Monte Rosa is one of the high mountains surrounding the 40-kilometre-long (25 mi) Matter Valley south of Stalden. On the southwest to west are Liskamm, Zwillinge with Castor and Pollux, the Breithorn and the Matterhorn; on the north are the Weisshorn and the Dom. The Gornergrat summit, lying 8 km (5.0 mi) on the north-west at 3,100 metres (10,200 ft), is a popular viewpoint of the massif, since it is accessible by train from Zermatt, using the highest open-air railway line in Europe.