1906. No. 3. AMUNDSEN’S OCEANOGRAPHIC OBSERVATIONS IN 1901. 21 
In the writers memoir on the “Oceanography of the North Polar 
Basin”! attention was drawn to the extremely cold and heavy bottom-water 
in the eastern part of the Barents Sea, especially off the coast of Novaya 
Zemlya. At our Stations 1 and 4, in July 1893 ?, water with a temperature 
of — 114°C. and — 111°C. and salinity of 35'01 °/oo and 34'99 "/003 was 
observed near the bottom, whilst the salinity was much lower in all over- 
lying strata. At our Stat. 3 there was a bottom layer nearly 100 metres 
thick with temperature below — 1°3°C., near the bottom it was — 163 C. 
and salinity about 34°88 %00%. At Wollebak’s Station II (WII, Fig. 1, 
p. 24) off Novaya Zemlya (71° 48'N. Lat., 49° 38° E. Long.), on May 31, 19004, 
the bottom-water (in 120 metres, 8 metres above the bottom) had a temperature 
of — 1:80" C., and a salinity of 35'165 /003, which gives a density (07) in situ 
of 28°33. This is the heaviest sea-water which to writers knowledge has 
been observed anywhere in the Ocean. The salinity of the strata over- 
lying this bottom-layer was 34'88 "00 with a temperature of — 165 € 
(see Table later p. 40). 
In the summer of 1893, Dr. Knipowitsch also observed the low 
temperatures of this cold bottom-water at various Stations in the eastern 
Barents Sea®, but his methods of determining the specific gravity was not 
sufficiently accurate to bring out its very high salinity. In recent years, 
after 1900, both Dr. Knipowitsch and Dr. Breitfuss have made highly 
interesting observations on the occurrence and distribution of this cold 
water”. Some observations taken near the bottom’, may be given as 
examples in the Table on the next page. 
The writer previously held the opinion” that the cold bottom-water 
of the Barents Sea is divided into two portions — the northern cold bottom- 
water coming from the sea to the north, northeast, and east, and the 
southern bottom-water having two or three sources, viz. bottom-currents 
from the east and north east, and the surface of the sea itself, which is 
I The Norw. N. Polar Exp. 1893—1896, Scientific Results, vol. III, No. 9, pp. 
279— 283. 
2 Op. cit. p. 244. ‘ 
3 All salinities are here computed by means of Knudsen’s Tables. 
4 Nansen, op. sit. p. 273- 
5 As to the accuracy of this value see below p. 40. 
6 Knipowitsch, Bulletin de l'Académie imper. des Sciences de St. Petersbourg, vol. 
VII, No. 3, 1877, pp. 269 et seg. (Russian). 
Cf. Knipowitsch, Ann. d. Hydro u. Marit. Meteorologie, 1905. 
8 Cf. Conseil Permanent International pour I'Exploration de la Mer, Bulletin des Resultats 
Acquis pendant les Courses Periodiques, Copenhagen, Aug. 1901, May 1903, May and 
Aug. 1904. 
2 Op. Sit, p.280. 
