# El Altar

- **Country:** Ecuador
- **Coordinates:** -1.663333, -78.409167
- **Age:** Pliocene-Pleistocene
- **Type:** Stratovolcano (extinct)
- **Range:** Andes
- **Listing:** UltraList of volcanoes in Ecuador
- **Location:** Ecuador
- **Map Size:** 260
- **Map Relief:** 1
- **Other Name:** Capak Urcu
- **Elevation M:** 5319
- **First Ascent:** 7 July 1963 by Marino Tremonti, Ferdinando Gaspard and Claudio Zardini
- **Prominence M:** 2072
- **Easiest Route:** rock/ice climb
- **Last Eruption:** Unknown
- **Label Position:** right

El Altar or Capac Urcu (possibly from Kichwa kapak principal, great, important / magnificence, urku mountain) is an extinct volcano on the western side of Sangay National Park in Ecuador, south of Quito, with a highest point of . Spaniards named it so because it resembled two nuns and four friars listening to a bishop around a church altar. In older English sources it is also called The Altar.

![Photo of El Altar](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/cb/Volc%C3%A1n_El_Altar_-_Riobamba_Ecuador.jpg)

**Source:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Altar (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)