The row over which of the big things floating round the Sun can be called planets is still going on. Not that this is stopping people naming individual wotsits.

The International Astronomical Union has decided that ‘dwarf planet’ 2003 EL61 should henceforth be known as Haumea (press release). Haumea is a Hawaiian goddess of earth and fertility and, as MSNBC notes, was one of the triggers for the whole ongoing ‘what is a planet anyway’ debate.

Astronomer Mike Brown has an amazing tale of discovering the dwarf planet, being scooped on claiming it by a Spanish team and then being embroiled in skulduggery and international craziness as allegations emerged that some people (possibly but not necessarily the Spanish team) had been using his telescope logs to infer that he had found something interesting.

Space.com plays safe, noting in its story that:

The discovery of the odd, football-shaped Haumea was first announced in 2005. It was found by a group led by Jose-Luis Ortiz of the Sierra Nevada Observatory in Spain, as well as a team led by Mike Brown of Caltech, who was also behind the discovery of the dwarf planet Eris.

Brown says:

The committee that voted to accept the name has said that, while they will take the name proposed by our team rather than the name proposed by the Spanish team, they are not favoring one claim over the other. They will let posterity decide.

OK, posterity, have at it. If I am no longer around to hear the news on the decision, that’s ok, you can tell my daughter Lilah instead. She will have been waiting, nearly precisely, her entire life.

“Haumea’s two moons were also given Hawaiian names—Hi‘iaka and Namaka—after two of Haumea’s daughters,” note Hawaii Today. “According to myth, Haumea’s children were created from different parts of her body. Similarly, the moons of the dwarf planet were believed to have been broken off its body by an ancient collision.”

The Honolulu Star Bulletin adds:

Another of Haumea’s children is volcano goddess Pele, but that name is already used as the name of a giant sulfur volcano on Jupiter’s moon Io.

Haumea is the second dwarf planet beyond Neptune with a Polynesian name. Makemake was the name approved for another dwarf in June.

Makemake is the Rapa Nui, or Easter Island, name for a creation god. The Hawaiian equivalent is ma’ema’e, which means purity, but there is no corresponding Hawaiian god.

Image: detail from Comparison of Kuiper Belt Object Sizes (artists impression) / NASA, ESA, and A. Feild (STScI)