Pribilof Islands
group of islands in Aleutians West Census Area, Alaska, United States

The Pribilof Islands (formerly the Northern Fur Seal Islands; Aleut: Amix̂, Russian: Острова Прибылова, romanized: Ostrova Pribylova) are a group of four volcanic islands off the coast of mainland Alaska, in the Bering Sea, about 200 miles (320 km) north of Unalaska and 200 miles (320 km) southwest of Cape Newenham. The islands are part of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge. The Siberian coast is roughly 500 miles (800 km) northwest. About 75 square miles (194 km2) in total area, they are mostly rocky and are covered with tundra, with a population of 572 as of the 2010 census.
Principal islands
The Principal islands are Saint Paul and Saint George. The former was named for the Feast of Saints Peter and Paul, on the day of which the island was first encountered by the Russian explorer Gavriil Pribylov; the latter was probably named for the ship sailed by Pribylov. The Otter and Walrus islets are near St. Paul. The total land area of all the islands is 75.072 sq mi (194.44 km2). The islands are part of the Bering Sea unit of the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Pribilof Islands” as group of islands in Aleutians West Census Area, Alaska, United States. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 11, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1144173. VIAF identifies the subject as 234761136. The Library of Congress control number is sh85106607. Authority coordinates are 57.180, -170.234. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2010.
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This entry incorporates text from “Pribilof Islands” 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.