Naming of Mount Everest

Mount Everest is named after the Surveyor General of India, George Everest. Name Everest is popular used in western countries now, but not so accepted in China and Nepal.

What to name the hghest peak Mount Everest  in the world is another challenge after the height was established.
 

There are many local names for the mountain, such as Kangchenjuga, Dhaulagiri, Deodungha, Chomolungma, etc, which are mainly named by Nepalese and Tibetans. Andrew Scott Waugh, a British army officer, surveyor and the one who named Mt. Everest, argued that there was no commonly used local name of the mountain. His search for local names of the mountain was hampered by Tibet and Nepal’s exclusion of foreigners. The name Chomolungma used to appear on the map in Paris which published in 1733 by D’Anville, a French geographer. An than in later 19^th Century, “Gaurisankar” was believed by many European cartograohers as a common native name of the mountain while “Gaurisankar”actually is the name of the mountain between Everest and Kanthmandu.

 

Waugh argued that there are so many local names and it was hard to pick one better than others. He recommended naming the Peak XV after his predecessor who was the Surveyor General of India, George Everest. George Everest opposed his recommendation and told the Royal Geographical Society that the name Everest could not pronounced by native Indians and written in Hindi. Though there were many objections of Waugh’s propose, the Royal Geographical Society still officially adopted the name Mt. Everest for the world’s highest mountain in 1865. And the pronunciation of Everest /'evərist/ is different from that of the Sir George’s first name Everest /'i:vərist/.

 

Qomolangma is the official name of the mountain in Tibet. It can be also spelled Chonolungma, literally “Holy Mother”. The official Chinese name of the Mt. Everest is Zhumulangma and it also known as Shengmu Feng sometimes. The Nepalese government created a Nepali name for the mountain, Sagarmāthā, in 1960s.

 

The name of Mt. Everest still not firmed

The name Mt. Everest is popular used in western countries by not so agreed by Tibetans and Nepalese. Since 1719, the Mt. Everest has been known to Tibetans and mapped by Chinese as “Qomolangma”. British colonialists were not the “First Discover”of the world’s highest mountain. In 2002, newspaper, Chinese People’s Daily, published and article against the use of the name “Mount Everest”in English and insisted that “Mount Qomolangma”, based on local name in Tibet, should be the official name in the world