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[1] A function that approximates atmospheric tidal behavior in the polar regions is described. This function is fitted to multistation radar measurements of wind in the mesosphere and lower thermosphere with the aim of obtaining a latitude-longitude-height description of the variation of tides over the whole Antarctic continent. Archival wind data sets are combined with present-day ones to fill the spatial distribution of the observations and to reduce the potential effects of spatial aliasing. Multiple years are combined through the compilation of monthly station composite days, yielding results for each month of the year. Despite potential problems associated with year-to-year variations in the tidal phase, a useful climatology of Antarctic zonal and meridional tidal wind components is compiled. The results of the fits reproduce the major features of the high-latitude tidal wind field: the dominance of the semidiurnal migrating mode in the winter months and the presence of a semidiurnal zonal wave number one component in the summer months. It is also found that the summer semidiurnal tide contains a zonal wave number zero component.

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A 12‐hour oscillation in the horizontal motion of the neutral mesosphere near the South Pole has been determined from optical measurements of the Doppler shift of the OH emission in this region of the upper atmosphere. The measurement of this wave's phase progression with longitude shows this wave to be a westward‐traveling zonal wavenumber one mode. The absence of significant oscillation at this periodicity in the simultaneously measured mesospheric temperature is consistent with the zonal wavenumber one determination. Tentative assignment of this oscillation to an inertio‐gravity wave has been made based on these findings. The observation of this 12‐hour periodicity oscillation as a zonal wavenumber one motion precludes its identification as a zonal wavenumber two semidiurnal tide.

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