Vertical accelerometers deployed on fast ice in Raudfjorden, Svalbard in early summer 1983 recorded characteristics of ice-coupled waves at the ice edge and during their passage under die ice sheet. Subsequent analysis indicated an unexpected increase in amplitude of waves of all periods some 20 to 30 m in from die ice edge. This is associated with a pair of heavily-damped waves, which become especially relevant at or beyond some critical angle and decay rapidly with distance from the edge; their coalescence may account for the increase in wave amplitude, and explain why ice tends to break out in strips parallel to the ice edge.

Southernmost of the Falkland Islands, Beauchêne Island (52° 54' S, 59° 09' W, area 3 km2) is a wildlife reserve with large colonies of Black-browed albatrosses and Rockhopper penguins. Discovered and named in 1701 by the French explorer Jacques Gouin de Beauchesne, it was noted by many early navigators and visited frequently by fur sealers in the 19th century. This article draws attention to early reports and outlines what is known of its history.

The Sea Ice Group of the Scort Polar Research Institute, University of Cambridge, took part in the international Marginal Ice Zone Experiment 1984 (MIZEX 84) from 12 June to 26 July, operating from icebreaker FS Polarstern and chartered sealing vessel Kvitbjørn in the Greenland Sea. Observations included measurement of ice edge kinetics, wave-ice interactions and upper ocean structure and processes; ocean surface measurements and pressure ridge profile studies were also made in the same area during a post-MIZEX cruise in MS Lance.

The personal papers of Admiral Dufek, former Antarctic Projects Officer of the United States Department of Defense, provide insights into the political negotiations (May 1958 to October 1959) that immediately preceded the international Antarctic Conference and prepared the way for the Antarctic Treaty of 1959. The papers, lodged with the University of Syracuse, disclose information hitherto unpublished on the first 26 preparatory meetings, with interesting sidelights recording the attitudes of the 12 governments taking part in the discussions, and showing the origins of the draft treaty from which the Antarctic Treaty evolved.

The Russian explorer V. A. Rusanov's geological expeditions to Novaya Zemlya (1908–11) gained him the experience that, in 1912, secured his appointment as leader of a government expedition to Svalbard. In the sealing ship Gerkules Rusanov and 14 others left Aleksandrovsk on 26 June, spending most of July and August staking claims, collecting specimens and inspecting coalmining operation around the islands. In late August Gerkules headed east for Novaya Zemlya and an attempt at the Northeast Passage. Neither ship nor crew were seen again, but relics of the expedition have since been found on islands in the Kara Sea; in 1978 a plaque commemorating the expedition was erected on Mys Primetnyy, where a campsite and many relics were identified.

Charles Darwin's notes, diary entries and letters covering visits to southern South America and the Falkland Islands in 1833 and 1834 throw light on the revolutionary events of the time. His notes also contain the first indication of an evolutionary concept, suggested by the endemic flora and fauna of the Falklands, which guided his later observations on the Galapagos Islands and lead ultimately to his theory of evolution by natural selection.

The Transglobe Expedition (leader Sir Ranulph Fiennes, Bt.), circumnavigated the world between September 1979 and 1982, keeping as close as possible to the Greenwich meridian. This involved journeys in both polar regions. During the expedition's southern phase (1979–81) two overwintering bases were established in Antarctica and a party of three crossed the icecap on snowmobiles, via the South Pole. During the northern phase (1981–83) two men traversed the Northwest Passage by boat on foot, sledging across Ellesmere Island to the settlement of Alert, where a party of three overwintered. Two then set out over the pack ice, crossing the North Pole and drifting with the floating ice toward Svalbard, to be picked up by the expedition ship.

Born in Annascaul, Ireland in 1877, Thomas Crean enlisted in the Royal Navy in 1893 and was serving in New Zealand when Scott's British National Antarctic Expedition passed through en route for McMurdo Sound, Antarctica. As an AB in Discovery he gained experience which he later put to good use in two further British expeditions, Scott's British Antarctic (Terra Nova) Expedition, in which he sledged to the polar plateau, and Shackleton's Imperial Tran-Antarctic (Endurance) Expedition, in which he was given charge of the dog teams, drifted on the pack ice of the Weddell Sea and took part in the epic open-boat journey to South Georgia.

Knud Johan Victor Rasmussen, who died just over 50 years ago on 21 December 1933, is known both for his Arctic exploration and for his interest in Eskimos, especially Greenlanders and their way of life.

His parents, Sofie Louise Susanne Fleischer (1842–1917) and Christian Vilhelm Rasmussen (1846–1918), married in 1875 in the small West Greenland town of Ilulissat (Jacobshavn), where Christian was a missionary and head of the local teachers' training college. Sofie's family had settled in Greenland more than a hundred years earlier, and several of her kin gained high positions in the administrative service. Knud, who was born on 7 June 1879, was the first of three children. His Eskimo heritage came from his great-grandmother, who was a native of West Greenland, and an early taste of Eskimo culture passed to him from his maternal grandmother, Iteraluk (1816–99). Knud's Eskimo name was Kunnnguaq. As a boy in Greenland he grew up with his own sled and dog team, learning to drive well. Though he attended school in Denmark from the age of 12, he remembered his Eskimo training; travels with dog sleds were to become an important feature of his expeditions in later years.

Albert Armitage was the second in command of both the Jackson-Harmsworth expedition of 1884–1897 and R. F. Scott's British National Antarctic Expedition, 1901–1904. He never led an expedition himself; as Frank Debenham wrote (1944), ‘For polar work his mind was perhaps not quite flexible enough or his aims were not sufficiently ambitious to make him lead an expedition of his own.’ Despite this he played a leading role in both expeditions, and contributed significantly to Arctic and Antarctic exploration.

Few paintings are better known to polar historians than Stephen Pearce's 1851 group portrait of the Arctic Council (Polar Record, 6 (43): 385). The Council consisted of experts consulted by the Admiralty for advice upon the search for Sir John Franklin and the crews of H.M.S. Erebus and Terror, which had been lost among the Canadian arctic islands since 1845. Of the ten persons represented all except one were either naval officers or civilians officially connected with the Navy. The exception was Edward Sabine, Colonel in the Royal Artillery. How did this landsman find his way into such a salty gathering?

As part of its commitment to the programme of the First International Polar Year (1882–83) the Deutsche Polarkomission dispatched an expedition to South Georgia (Schrader 1891; Baker 1982). The team consisted of seven scientists and observers, led by Dr K. Schrader and accompanied by a support group of four men. As with the other 13 expeditions of the International Polar Year, the major emphases were on studies of meteorology, magnetism and aurora, although the South Georgia station also had a secondary major task, that of observing the transit of Venus. Fortunately the Deutsche Polarkomission had the foresight to include a trained zoologist on the expedition, in the person of the medical officer, Dr Karl von den Steinen.

The thirty-sixth annual meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC) was held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, 18–22 June 1984, at the invitation of the Government of Argentina, under the chairmanship of E.H. Iglesias (Argentina). This was the first time since 1977 that the meeting had been held outside the United Kingdom, where the Secretariat has its headquarters. Thirty-seven of the Commission's 40 member nations attended. Observers were present from two non-member governments, five intergovernmental organisations (including the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation and the United Nations Environmental Programme) and 37 non-governmental conservation, animal welfare and trade organisations.

Initial results from a programme of drilling in eastern Taylor Valley, Ross Dependency, Antarctica, in 1982–83 show lithological correlations with earlier drilling work in the same area. A preliminary interpretation suggests that drift deposits represent at least two glacial episodes, probably Ross I and pre-Ross I, separated by periods of proglacial sandur development and lake sedimentation. Further drilling is planned for 1983–84.