The prominence of a peak is the least drop in height necessary in order to get from the summit to any higher terrain. This can be calculated for a given … See more

It is common to define a peak's parent as a particular peak in the higher terrain connected to the peak by the key col. If there are many higher peaks there are various ways of defining which one is the parent, not necessarily based on geological or … See more

The key col and parent peak are often close to the subpeak but this is not always the case, especially when the key col is relatively low. It is … See more

The parent peak may be either close or far from the subject peak. The summit of Mount Everest is the parent peak of Aconcagua in … See more

Prominence is interesting to many mountaineers because it is an objective measurement that is strongly correlated with the subjective significance of a summit. Peaks with low prominence are either subsidiary tops of some higher summit or relatively … See more

Alteration of the landscape by humans and presence of water features can give rise to issues in the choice of location and height of a summit or col. … See more

When the key col for a peak is close to the peak itself, prominence is easily computed by hand using a topographic map. However, when the key col is far away, or when one wants to … See more