At the same time I wrote a letter to Colonel Burrard and asked his opinion. Colonel Burrard answered in a letter, dated Dehra Dun August 3rd 191o. Its contents are so important, that they should be known and respected by everybody who feels tempted to baptise mountains and lakes. The following is an extract:
»With reference to your proposed names for ranges the Indian Survey has strictly refused to introduce personal names on its maps for so years, and looking back, I think, that its attitude has met with general approval. In 1858 the Survey gave the name of Everest to the highest mountain, calling it after the celebrated Indian geodesist. This name provoked a storm of opposition, which has continued up to the present time. The Survey have adhered to the name of Everest, but they resolved never again to introduce another English personal name on to the map of Asia. If they had not strictly adhered to this resolution, the maps of the Himalaya would now be covered with English names, — names of travellers, sportsmen, statesmen, governors, and women. In 1885 a political officer called the big mountain S.W. of Kash-gar 'Mount Dufferin' after the Indian Viceroy: the Indian Survey have not accepted it. The only personal names that the Indian Survey have accepted are: (I) Mount Everest in 1858. (2) The Hedin mountains I after yourself. (3) Such names as Prejevalski and Humboldt which were given by the Russians to portions of Northern Tibet which we had never explored, and for which we were not responsible. — It may seem ungenerous of me to object to the proposed names of Montgomerie and Strachey for ranges in Tibet, but the policy of the Indian Survey in refusing personal names has been beneficial to maps of India, and should be supported . . . There is a general opinion here that members of a Survey ought not to affix their names to geographical features. The moment that the Survey accepts personal names, it will receive numbers of requests. When there are several distinguished surveyors, who is to arbitrate as to which is the most distinguished? If we accept the name Montgomerie, another school of survey will ask us to accept Mount Holdich, and so on ad infinitum. The name of Ryder given by Herr Habenicht to the range north of the Brahmaputra has met with no approval in India. Ryder did not discover this range; he did not explore it . . . The Indian Survey has always called this range (since 1888) the Kailas range, because they thought that it was the same range (or earth-fold) on which stand the great Kailas peaks, the famous Hindu shrine north of Manasarowar. If the Kailas peaks are not on the western extension of this range, then the Kailas is wrong. — There are two other points about nomenclature that I think are worthy of consideration. One is this. In a complicated mountain area it is so difficult to analyse the individual ranges, that it is premature to distribute too many names. We have not invented any names for the numerous Himalayan ranges: we have accepted the native names, and have left the unnamed ranges without names. This course has proved advantageous, because detailed geological surveys are teaching us that the views of the original explorers about the separate ranges were incorrect. What they thought were ranges often prove not to be ranges. — My other point is this. The great objection to personal names is that the names proposed are all European. On the map of Asia no one has ever proposed to introduce the name of an Asiatic explorer. My opinion is, that no objection would be taken if you gave the name of Nain Singh, or of Krishna (A—K) to Tibet mountains. I believe
the Tsangpo are called, as Habenicht proposed, »Ryder-Kette». The name is written twice, which points to the fact that we have to deal with two different ranges, belonging to different earth-folds. The same is the case with B. I)omann's and H. Habenicht's beautiful map, N:o 62 in Stieler's Hand-Atlas, 1911.
I My Transhimalaya.
IIIFカラー高解像度
