I’m Mesopelagian, eh?

Of interest to everyone is the origin of the name of our great country Canada. Of even more interest are the names that almost were.

In particlular, Albion, which, “in the complex mythology of William Blake, is the primeval man whose fall and division results in the Four Zoas: Urizen, Tharmas, Luvah and Urthona,” seemed right on the mark since, in Canada, we really do have it all.

This stands in great contrast to the apocryphal version of the naming which states Spanish Explorers wrote on an early map aca nada or “nothing there.”

Originally suggested names for Canada:

* Albion
* Albionoria - “Albion of the north”
* Borealia – from ‘borealis’, the Latin word for ‘northern’; compare with Australia
* Cabotia – in honour of Italian explorer John Cabot, who explored the eastern coast of Canada for England
* Colonia
* Efisga - an acronym of “English, French, Irish, Scottish, German, Aboriginal”
* Hochelega – an old name for Montreal
* Mesopelagia - “land between the seas”
* Norland
* Superior
* Tuponia - derived from ‘The United Provinces of North America’
* Ursalia - “place of bears”
* Vesperia - “land of the evening star”
* Victorialand – in honour of Queen Victoria