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Payer Peak

mountain in Greenland

Architectural plans, a scale model, maps and brass measuring instruments
Places and architectureInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 15, 2026
Entity authorityQ24810239
Source-derived summary

Payer Peak, (Danish: Payer Tinde or Payers Fjeld) is a mountain in King Christian X Land, Northeast Greenland. Administratively it is part of the Northeast Greenland National Park zone.

The region around Payer Peak is uninhabited. This mountain is located in the high Arctic zone, where Polar climate prevails. The average annual temperature in the area is −17 °C. The warmest month is June when the average temperature rises to −2 °C and the coldest is November with −23 °C.

Geography

Payer Peak rises on the northern side of Suess Land in the inner Kaiser Franz Joseph Fjord only 4 km from the shore of the fjord. It is located south of Cape Payer, a headland in the fjord's southern coast.

Together with Petermann Peak this mountain was long believed to be one of the highest summits in northeastern Greenland, but its actual height does not reach 2,000 metres (6,562 ft).

It is marked as a 7,692-foot-high (2,345 m) peak in the Defense Mapping Agency Greenland Navigation charts and as a 2,320-metre-high (7,612 ft) mountain in other sources.

Historical background

Payer Peak was named Payer Spitze by Carl Koldewey during the Second German North Polar Expedition he led while first surveying and partially exploring Kaiser Franz Joseph Fjord in 1869–70. The peak was named after Austro-Hungarian arctic explorer Julius von Payer (1842–1915) who was co-leader of the expedition.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Payer Peak” as mountain in Greenland. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Payer, Peak and mountain.

Editorial reviewA strong orientation record where physical form, institutional use and historical geography need to be read together. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1869, 1842, 1915—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Payer, Peak and mountain providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Payer Peak”, the useful work is to connect “mountain in Greenland” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Place names and jurisdictional language are key evidence: both can reveal earlier catalogue descriptions and overlooked record series. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 15, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q24810239. Authority coordinates are 73.146, -26.390. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1869, 1842 and 1915.

Critical limits

A single description cannot reconcile every naming convention, rebuilding phase or administrative transfer associated with a place. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.

Best used for
  • Historic place names
  • Jurisdictional context
  • Routes into maps and plans
Verify next

Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Payer Peak”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Payer Peak primary sources, Payer Peak archive and Payer research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Payer Peak”?
  2. Which earlier names or jurisdictions may reveal additional records?
  3. What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Payer Peak” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.