Isola Ferdinandea. Breve resoconto di una storia onomastica emersa e inabissata

In July 1831, an extraordinary telluric phenomenon shakes the waters of the Mediterranean Sea and brings a volcanic island to life. The emergence of the new land leads to a conflict among the political-territorial interests of the United Kingdom, the Kingdom of France, and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, but above all to an “onomastic conflict” triggered by the presumed right of paternity over the newborn island, which was named by the numerous aspirants Ferdinandea, Julia, Hotham, Corrao, Graham, Sciacca, Nerita (and in the literary form Proserpina). The act of naming with anthroponymic character, reflected in this case and in many others, ultimately reveals plots of belonging, possession, action, power on a space. The unexpected sinking of the island of Ferdinandea puts an end to the quarrels, but its history remains alive in the collective memory in the form of a (literary) narrative and of a name that seems more and more indeterminate.