August Heinrich Petermann - Petermann Lives On

Petermann Lives On

Because Petermann provided so much supporting work during his lifetime, several physical features, especially in the Arctic, were named after him. In the NIMA-database the following seven toponyms are listed: Petermann Ranges (Antarctica), Petermann Ranges (Australia), Petermann Bjerg (= Fjeld, Peak, Bjaerg, Bjoerg), Petermann Glacier, Petermann Peninsula (= Halvø), Petermannbreen (= Glacier), Petermannfjellet (= Cape). According to Hugo Wichmann, Capt. Bullock was probably the first to name a physical feature after Petermann, on a printed English chart of 1860. In the same report he counts thirteen features in Asia, Australia and New Zealand, and the Arctic and Antarctic regions, named between 1860 and 1874. Some of them were renamed by other explorers and one turned out not to exist, Petermannland, an island North of Zemlya Frantsa-Iosifa (Franz Josef Land) sighted by Capt. Fligely and named by Julius Payer, which later proved nonexistent. We may keep this name in mind, however, as a proof of Petermann’s vision and drive to have the region explored, though this sometimes revealed different physical objects than he had hypothesized. In a later age, even a crater on the moon was given the name Petermann crater, situated halfway between Mare Humboldtianum and Peary in the northern polar region.

Petermann thought that the naming of newly discovered physical features was one of the privileges of a map-editor, especially as he was fed up with forever encountering toponyms like 'Victoria', 'Wellington', 'Smith', 'Jones', etc. He writes: "While constructing the new map to specify the detailed topographical portrayal and after consulting with and authorization of messr. v Heuglin and count Karl Graf von Waldburg-Zeil I have entered 118 names in the map: partly they are the names derived from celebrities of arctic explorations and discoveries, arctic travellers anyway as well as excellent friends, patrons, and participants of different nationalities in the newest northpolar expeditions, partly eminent German travellers in Africa, Australia, America ..." So the accompanying map of Svalbard is larded with features named after Barth, Behm, Berghaus, Bessel, Brehm, Breusing, Heuglin, Hochstetter, Koldewey, Lange, Mauch, Oetker, Payer, Perthes, Petermann, Ravenstein, Weyprecht, and Wilhelm.