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But glaciers began to advance again from the 15th century onwards, reaching their greatest extent around 1850 during what has been referred to as a mini ice age. Visiting Grindelwald in 1723 Horace Mann reported that an exorcist had been employed to halt the advance of the glaciers that were threatening to engulf the village, while a century later James David Forbes described an advancing glacier invading fields of corn, and of seeing peasants gathering ripe cherries ‘with one foot standing on the ice’.

GLACIER RETREAT: CONSEQUENCES FOR MOUNTAINEERING

Recent hot summers have seen the collapse of snow bridges adding to problems where access routes cross glaciers. In some years classic mixed faces have not been in condition (the White Spider section on the Eiger’s Nordwand disappeared in the summer of 2003), and where glaciers are in retreat they often leave behind hazardous slopes of steep and unstable rock. Shrinking icefields have had a significant effect on numerous routes, especially where the climber transfers from glacier to newly polished rockface. Here, as on the approach to several huts, metal ladders may have been bolted to the rock to secure progress, while melting permafrost not only leads to increased danger from stonefall, but also threatens the stability of installations such as pylons carrying cable cars.