The Mountaineer 
Volume Five Seattle, Washington Nineteen Twelve 
THE HIGHER FUNCTIONS OF A 
MOUNTAIN CLUB* 
WitwiaMm Frepertc BapE 
Mountaineering as a form of sport is a relatively recent 
arrival among the recreational interests of mankind. In vain 
one searches the literature of antiquity for evidence that the 
ancients were interested in the conquest of mountain heights for 
the satisfaction of athletic and aesthetic impulses. When moun- 
tain ranges have been successfully traversed in the pursuit of 
other ends, an ancient chronicler sometimes allows himself a 
momentary exultation, but more because of what has been 
escaped, than because of what has been braved. 
The earliest record of this kind known to me, made 1259 
B. C., more than a thousand years before Hannibal crossed the 
Alps, is an inscription on the front of the temple of Rameses II 
at Abusimbel, Egypt. It commemorates the arrival at the 
Egyptian court of King Hattusar of the Hittites and his 
daughter. Together with their retinue they had made the long 
journey of a thousand miles from central Asia Minor to Egypt, 
crossing the Taurus mountains in winter time. Although they 
doubtless selected the easiest passes, it was a notable achieve- 
ment, and was felt to be such by the Egyptian monarch, who 
three thousand years ago bade his scribe sculpture this simple 
tribute on the walls of the royal sanctuary: “What can these 
newcomers be like! To make such a journey when there goes 
not a messenger to Zahi in these days of flood on the upper 
heights in winter. . . . . The embassy came, their lLmbs 
being sound, and they were long in stride.” 
But instances of this kind, even, which exhibit mountaineer- 
ing as a necessity rather than as a diversion, must kave been 
rare in antiquity. While mountain fastnesses afforded shelter 
in times of war, their loftier summits were by the ancients 
believed to be the abodes of gods or spirits who were ready to 
*Dr Badé is the head of the Department of Semitic Languages in the 
Pacific Theological Seminary at Berkeley. He is editor of the Sierra Club 
Bulletin and has climbed mountains both here and abroad. 
