Great St Bernard Pass

Great St Bernard Pass
French: Col du Grand St-Bernard Italian: Colle del Gran San Bernardo German: Grosser Sankt Bernhard
View of the pass and hospice from Great St Bernard Lake
Elevation	2,469 m (8,100 ft)
Traversed by	Road
Location	Valais, Switzerland (near the Italian border)
Range	Pennine Alps
Coordinates	45°52′08″N 7°10′14″E / 45.86889°N 7.17056°E / 45.86889; 7.17056Coordinates: 45°52′08″N 7°10′14″E / 45.86889°N 7.17056°E / 45.86889; 7.17056
Topo map	Swiss Federal Office of Topography swisstopo
Location in Switzerland

Great St. Bernard Pass (French: Col du Grand St-Bernard, Italian: Colle del Gran San Bernardo, German: Grosser Sankt Bernhard; 2,469 m (8,100 ft)) is the third highest road pass in Switzerland. It connects Martigny in the canton of Valais in Switzerland with Aosta in the region Aosta Valley in Italy. It is the lowest pass lying on the ridge between the two highest summits of the Alps, Mont Blanc and Monte Rosa. The pass itself is located in Switzerland in the canton of Valais, very close to Italy. It is located on the main watershed that separates the basin of the Rhône from that of the Po.

Great St. Bernard is the most ancient pass through the Western Alps, with evidence of use as far back as the Bronze Age and surviving traces of a Roman road. In 1800, Napoleon's army used the pass to enter Italy, an event depicted in Jacques-Louis David's Napoleon at the Saint-Bernard Pass and Hippolyte Delaroche's Bonaparte Crossing the Alps, both notable oil paintings. Having been bypassed by easier and more practical routes, particularly the Great St Bernard Tunnel which opened in 1964, its value today is mainly historical and recreational.