Kirwan Escarpment is a prominent northwest-facing escarpment

Escarpment

An escarpment is a steep slope or long cliff that occurs from erosion or faulting and separates two relatively level areas of differing elevations.-Description and variants:...

 which lies south of the Penck Trough

Penck Trough

Penck Trough is a broad ice-filled valley trending SW-NE. for about 60 miles between Borg Massif and the northeast part of Kirwan Escarpment, in Queen Maud Land. Discovered by the Third German Antarctic Expedition , led by Capt. Alfred Ritscher, and named for German geographer Albrecht Penck...

 in Queen Maud Land

Queen Maud Land

Queen Maud Land is a c. 2.7 million-square-kilometre region of Antarctica claimed as a dependent territory by Norway. The territory lies between 20° west and 45° east, between the British Antarctic Territory to the west and the Australian Antarctic Territory to the east. The latitudinal...

. The escarpment is featured by moderate-height cliffs and prominent rock spurs interspersed with glaciers and steep ice slopes and trends NE-SW for about 90 miles. At least the northern end of this feature (Neumayer Cliffs

Neumayer Cliffs

Neumayer Cliffs is a series of abrupt rock cliffs forming the northeast end of Kirwan Escarpment in Queen Maud Land. Discovered by the German Antarctic Expedition under Ritscher, 1938–39, and named for German geophysicist Georg von Neumayer. Surveyed by the Norwegian-British-Swedish Antarctic...

) was included in the aerial photography of the general area by the German Antarctic Expedition (1938–39), but the maps resulting from that expedition do not portray the escarpment properly. The escarpment was mapped by Norwegian cartographers from surveys and air photos (1958–59) and named for Laurence P. Kirwan, Director of the Royal Geographical Society

Royal Geographical Society

The Royal Geographical Society is a British learned society founded in 1830 for the advancement of geographical sciences...

.