Battle Naming Conventions

So, in the Honorverse, it appears to me that a naval battle is named after the star that is creating the hyper limit that the battle is fought in, or if it is outside of the stellar limit, it is named after the closest named thing.

That is why there is "The Second Battle of Yeltsin" and "The First Battle of Hancock" after the stars, "The Battle of Blackbird" after the moon it happened around, and "The Battle of Selker Rift" after the named section of hyper space they were in. The battle that Helen Z. Sr. died in was probably named after the wave they were in.

Now, this might be a little pedantic of me, but it has been itching in the back of my brain for a while now. Why is it called "The Battle of Manticore" and not Manticore A? It is obviously not named after the planet, because it happened closer to Sphinx than to Manticore. It might be referring to the system in general, but given the size of the binary system, I think that feels kind of be like referring to Gettysburg in the American Civil War as "The Battle of Pennsylvania." And if it is the system, then Blackbird should be another Yeltsin, because it is in the system, even if it is outside the hyper limit.

The naming of battles is often a bit controversial. For example, on July 15th 1410 the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania defeated the knights of the Teutonic Order. Depending on who you ask, this was the Battle of Grunwald or the Battle of Tannenburg - Germans, and by extension the rest of Western Europe, call it Tannenburg because that's where the Teutonic Order arrived at the battlefield from. Eastern Europe calls it Grunwald because 'their' side arrived at the battle from there.

The hyper limit argument doesn't really work, because Blackbird doesn't have one (or at least, not one that's beyond its surface). Blackbird is a moon, the hyper limit belongs to Uriel, the gas giant Blackbird orbits.

The name of the battle tends to refer to the place where it was fought which, given the nature of Honorverse battles, generally can't be nailed down more precisely than a star system. First Yeltsin (the loss of Madrigal) happened well away from the planets, so it was named after the system. Second Yeltsin (Fearless v Thunder of God) was a long running battle around the inner system, so again there's no more precise landmark to tie it to. First Manticore rampaged all over the system (you could make an argument for calling it the Battle of Manticore-A, but the battle was fought for control of the whole of the Binary System, so it's a bit pedantic and might well annoy those already-irritable highlanders on Gryphon - they had as much at stake as anyone on Manticore or Sphinx).

Blackbird was an exception because, other than the exchange of missiles on initial approach, the battle was fought a point-blank range in orbit of Blackbird itself.

Hi Crewdude48,

I've always used BoMA, ie Battle of Manticore A for that very reason, and it was immediately accepted at the bar and here very quickly to separate it from the battles known to have happened much earlier, though some now use First Manticore.

Second Manticore refers to Filaretta, despite the battles long ago, since those that use the term aren't thinking of the historical ones, about which we still know little at this time.

Historical naming and attribution isn't fair, as a number of examples can demonstrate.

L

crewdude48 wrote:So, in the Honorverse, it appears to me that a naval battle is named after the star that is creating the hyper limit that the battle is fought in, or if it is outside of the stellar limit, it is named after the closest named thing.

That is why there is "The Second Battle of Yeltsin" and "The First Battle of Hancock" after the stars, "The Battle of Blackbird" after the moon it happened around, and "The Battle of Selker Rift" after the named section of hyper space they were in. The battle that Helen Z. Sr. died in was probably named after the wave they were in.

Now, this might be a little pedantic of me, but it has been itching in the back of my brain for a while now. Why is it called "The Battle of Manticore" and not Manticore A? It is obviously not named after the planet, because it happened closer to Sphinx than to Manticore. It might be referring to the system in general, but given the size of the binary system, I think that feels kind of be like referring to Gettysburg in the American Civil War as "The Battle of Pennsylvania." And if it is the system, then Blackbird should be another Yeltsin, because it is in the system, even if it is outside the hyper limit.

crewdude48 wrote:So, in the Honorverse, it appears to me that a naval battle is named after the star that is creating the hyper limit that the battle is fought in, or if it is outside of the stellar limit, it is named after the closest named thing.

That is why there is "The Second Battle of Yeltsin" and "The First Battle of Hancock" after the stars, "The Battle of Blackbird" after the moon it happened around, and "The Battle of Selker Rift" after the named section of hyper space they were in. The battle that Helen Z. Sr. died in was probably named after the wave they were in.

Now, this might be a little pedantic of me, but it has been itching in the back of my brain for a while now. Why is it called "The Battle of Manticore" and not Manticore A? It is obviously not named after the planet, because it happened closer to Sphinx than to Manticore. It might be referring to the system in general, but given the size of the binary system, I think that feels kind of be like referring to Gettysburg in the American Civil War as "The Battle of Pennsylvania." And if it is the system, then Blackbird should be another Yeltsin, because it is in the system, even if it is outside the hyper limit.

It also depend on which countries, regions involved during the American Civil War the USA and CSA referred to battles differently the USA used geographical features such as rivers or hills while the CSA used nearby towns.

USA
Battle of Antietam (Antietam Creek)
CSA
Battle of Sharpsburg (nearby town)

USA
Battle of Bull Run 1&2 (Bull Run Creek)
CSA
Battle of Manassas 1&2 (Manassas R&R juct.)

USA
Battle of Pittsburg Landing
CSA
Battle of Shiloh (Shiloh Church)

crewdude48 wrote:So, in the Honorverse, it appears to me that a naval battle is named after the star that is creating the hyper limit that the battle is fought in, or if it is outside of the stellar limit, it is named after the closest named thing.

That is why there is "The Second Battle of Yeltsin" and "The First Battle of Hancock" after the stars, "The Battle of Blackbird" after the moon it happened around, and "The Battle of Selker Rift" after the named section of hyper space they were in. The battle that Helen Z. Sr. died in was probably named after the wave they were in.

Now, this might be a little pedantic of me, but it has been itching in the back of my brain for a while now. Why is it called "The Battle of Manticore" and not Manticore A? It is obviously not named after the planet, because it happened closer to Sphinx than to Manticore. It might be referring to the system in general, but given the size of the binary system, I think that feels kind of be like referring to Gettysburg in the American Civil War as "The Battle of Pennsylvania." And if it is the system, then Blackbird should be another Yeltsin, because it is in the system, even if it is outside the hyper limit.

"Argue not with pedants, you will only confuse yourself and entertain the pedant"

My Favorite example of naming a battle was an account by S. L. A. Marshall. He got a 2:00am phone call about the naming of a battle that broke out in the Ardennes. After 45 minutes of arguing about it they agreed to call it the "Battle of the Ardennes, 1944-1945." And so it is called in US Army archives. The Press called it "The Battle of the Bulge."

saber964 wrote:

crewdude48 wrote:So, in the Honorverse, it appears to me that a naval battle is named after the star that is creating the hyper limit that the battle is fought in, or if it is outside of the stellar limit, it is named after the closest named thing.

That is why there is "The Second Battle of Yeltsin" and "The First Battle of Hancock" after the stars, "The Battle of Blackbird" after the moon it happened around, and "The Battle of Selker Rift" after the named section of hyper space they were in. The battle that Helen Z. Sr. died in was probably named after the wave they were in.

Now, this might be a little pedantic of me, but it has been itching in the back of my brain for a while now. Why is it called "The Battle of Manticore" and not Manticore A? It is obviously not named after the planet, because it happened closer to Sphinx than to Manticore. It might be referring to the system in general, but given the size of the binary system, I think that feels kind of be like referring to Gettysburg in the American Civil War as "The Battle of Pennsylvania." And if it is the system, then Blackbird should be another Yeltsin, because it is in the system, even if it is outside the hyper limit.

It also depend on which countries, regions involved during the American Civil War the USA and CSA referred to battles differently the USA used geographical features such as rivers or hills while the CSA used nearby towns.

USA
Battle of Antietam (Antietam Creek)
CSA
Battle of Sharpsburg (nearby town)

USA
Battle of Bull Run 1&2 (Bull Run Creek)
CSA
Battle of Manassas 1&2 (Manassas R&R juct.)

USA
Battle of Pittsburg Landing
CSA
Battle of Shiloh (Shiloh Church)

I was going to say the same thing about American Civil War battles....

You should see what librarians have to go through! There is a principle of library science about disambiguation of names. We need to distinguish between the Robert Frost who was a poet early last century, the Robert Frost who owned property in Maine in 1745, the Robert Frost who wrote on law and letters patent in 1891, the Robert Frost who wrote on kinesiology in 2001, and a dozen other Robert Frosts who appear in library catalogs. And we need to link names together, like Samuel Langhorne Clemens, Mark Twain, Quintus Curtius Snodgrass, and Louis de Conte, since people might look for him under any of those names.

The "authorized form" in library catalogs for the Battle of the Bulge is "Ardennes, Battle of, 1944-1945", and is linked to alternative form "Bulge, Battle of, 1944-1945" and "Bastogne, Battle of, 1944-1945".

But historians don't have to be as consistent as librarians. Different historians will use different names for battles depending on nationality, language, decade, or even professional rivalries. Names will change over the years. Politicians might use one name while soldiers use another, and historians ten years later yet another. Multiple battles might have identical names, distinguishable only by context, without even the addition of First, Second, etc. Battles and wars might be named for municipalities, geographic features, combattants, or temporal span.

So there isn't much point in looking for rational explanations for naming battles. There isn't any, on the larger scale. There might (maybe) be some consistency within a limited scope, but don't count on it.

If you want rationality in naming, become a librarian.