A name up in the air

Press, 9 August 1985, Page 16

A name up in the air

Mount Egmont is one of New Zealand’s most distinctive features. Its symmetric, snow-clad peak, a delight to European artists and photographers for the last 150 years, has also played an important part in Maori mythology. The Maori request that it revert to its original name, rather than continue to honour an Irish earl who was First Lord of the Admiralty in Captain Cook’s time, is understandable. One difficulty, not yet acknowledged by the Geographic Board, is which Maori name? The board has approved the name Taranaki — which strictly should be Tara-a-naki. Tara-a-naki probably meant “the peak free of vegetation.” At least three other Maori names for the mountain are also on record, with claims that may be as old as Taranaki. It has been called Puke haupapa, or ice-hill; Puke-o-Naki, which is mildly rude; and Tama-ahua, after one of the first Maoris said to have climbed to the top.

Tinkering with place-names can be an unrewarding business. Quirks of fate have played a large part in geographic labels round the world. Once changes are begun, in the interest of some asserted greater accuracy, or to make political points, the difficulty is to know where to stop. The Russians turned Tsaritsyn on the Volga into Stalingrad after the Revolution of 1917, then had to change it again, hastily, to Volgograd when Stalin fell out of favour. In Central Europe, towns and cities in Poland, Germany, and other countries have changed name with the fortunes of war and the movement of political boundaries.

Closer to home, the Maoris named a harbour Te Whakaraupo and early settlers called it Port Cooper after a pioneer trader. Later settlers turned it into Lyttelton Harbour. An Otago river, once Mata-au, became the Molyneux before it was the Clutha. Elsewhere, the Cape of Storms was renamed the Cape of Good Hope to encourage those who sailed that way. The weather took no notice and the point where the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian Ocean meet has stubbornly refused to become a storm-free zone. Against that, Poverty Bay round Gisborne has become a prosperous community in spite of its name.

New Zealand itself takes its name from a brief Dutch connection more than 300 years ago. Australia is a corruption of a Latin name for what was, for centuries, only a hypothetical continent — Terra Australis. With use, names take on an identity of their own. The origins, become irrelevant. Does it matter now which of the Avon Rivers in the British Isles gave its name to the Christchurch Avon? For those who live here the Avon is this Avon.

So it may be irrelevant to consider how Mount Egmont came to be so called, or what its earlier names may have been. To most New Zealanders today, Egmont means the striking North Island mountain in the colour pictures. Taranaki calls to mind a gate or a rugby team. Change the mountain’s name, let a couple of generations go by, and Taranaki could mean a mountain too. Is it worth the effort of making the change?