What's in a name? The origins of names of storms and places

In the middle of the global pandemic, our part of the world was hit earlier this year by the cyclone Amphan in the Bay of Bengal. Some other storms we have weathered in the past are Kyar, Maha, Vayu, Hikka, Fani and so on.

The unique and distinctive name given to these storms is a recent phenomenon. Several hundred years back, storms and hurricanes were identified by their latitude-longitude and the year in which they occurred. Over time it was felt that naming the storms with short and easily remembered names would help in faster communications and cutting down human errors, especially in exchanging information between hundreds of coastal bases and ships at sea.

In the early days, the storms were named after places or celebratory days on which they occur, like ‘hurricane Saint Ana’ which struck Puerto Rico in 1825. The usage of personal names for storms and cyclones was introduced by Clement Lindsey Wragge, the celebrated Australian meteorologist. It is said that he used feminine names for gentle storms and politicians’ names, who denied him promotion or funding, for severe unpleasant storms.

Of course, the locals did not let him have the naming privileges exclusively. Clement Wragge himself was named “Inclement Wragge” for a couple of reasons. The weather conditions in the mountains of Australia were appalling and the poor man was often forecasting inclement weather.

When the European settlers stepped onto the shores of Van Dieman’s island (present-day Tasmania) in the 1800s, naming of the places was left to local administrators. In the capital Hobart region, there are a few places named after Indian cities. I was curiously surprised to see the names on the signboards giving directions to Mangalore and Howrah from Hobart.

Apparently a lot of early surveyors and road builders in Tasmania were ex-Indian officers of British origin who were favourably inclined to bestow Indian names. A suburb of Hobart situated along the shores of the Derwent River is known as Howrah.

A retired army officer named his property built on these plains as ‘Howrah house’ in the year 1830. Later the whole region was named after that house as Howrah. There are three towns named after ‘Namma Mangaluru’ in Australia, one in Queensland, another in Victoria and a third in Tasmania. Incidentally, Mangalore of Tasmania is situated between the townships of Bagdad and Brighton!

Bagdad is the town named by the explorer Hugh Germain, a Sergeant in the Royal Marines. He was known to carry two books in his saddlebags while travelling, the Bible and the Arabian Nights for his naming inspiration. Thus, today one finds Jerusalem, Jericho, River Jordan, Lake Tiberius and Bagdad within close proximity to Hobart.