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From: "Ian Currie" <>
Subject: Re: [ZA-EC] Place name changes.
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2008 20:49:49 +0200
References: <003201c8fbee$ff8d07c0$eb9fd0c4@kirkman><48A3038E.7050009@googlemail.com>


Further to this debate, I would like to know about the official names for
the provinces during Union. I know that during the First Republic the Cape
was officially The Province of the Cape of Good Hope. And what was it during
colonial times? Simply Cape Colony? Was Free State officially the Boer
republic of the Orange Free State, or simply Oranjevrystaat?

Can anyone help on this question?

Thanks
Ian Currie
----- Original Message -----
From: "Pat" <>
To: <>
Sent: Wednesday, August 13, 2008 5:53 PM
Subject: Re: [ZA-EC] Place name changes.


> Hi Gang,
> Some years ago (I think in the early 70's) a committee/commission was
> set up to try to standardise on South African place names. After much
> deliberation, which included study of historical records, local usage
> and dominant preference they came up with a list of names that had to be
> used in official documents/publications. In the course of this exercise
> they decided that Kingwilliamstown would be King William's Town,
> Simonstown would be Simon's Town and that Grahamstown would be spelt in
> this way and not Graham's Town. The original database can still be
> searched on the Department of Arts and Culture website at this
> address(http://sagns.dac.gov.za/ selecting "Search" and "Surveys and
> Mapping"). Peter's point regarding the date of acceptance is still
> valid. In order to use the correct name for a particular event we need
> to know when the change took place. This database does sometimes give a
> changeover date, but not often.
> The same body also tried to deal with the issue of Afrikaans and
> English spelling and they did rule on some of these but I think that it
> proved too controversial to try and enforce any one usage. One place
> that I can recall where they did make a ruling was a small forest
> station in the southern Cape which was usually called Blouleliesbos but
> they determined that this should be Blue Lilies Bush.
> Of course things are changing rapidly and one does not know if any of
> these rules are still being applied (apart from the official name
> changes that are now being implemented) except in such areas as the
> official trig survey maps.
>
> cheers,
>
> Paddy
>
> Peter Kirkman wrote:
>> This topic was given quite a bit of air on the list some months back :
>> how to deal in one's records with the constant changing of place names.
>>
>> This query is a little more subtle and deals with the change of spelling
>> (or is it syntax?). For example, when did Graham's Town evolve into
>> Grahamstown? Is there a logical cut-off date? The usage of the modern
>> form looks ridiculous when used in, say, 1820 and other early context.
>> Usage of the quaint old form looks equally out of place in the context of
>> modern documents, so where do we split? Raper's dictionary of place
>> names is unhelpful in this regard. The place is called "Grahamstown",
>> but there is reference to it first being named "Graham's Town". I look
>> forward to the advice of our place-name fundis. I guess the same applies
>> to King William's Town / Kingwilliamstown.
>>
>> Regards - Peter
>>
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