Celeste, Malta, Tennessee Mountain, banana fanna, etc.

Why are there so many name for what is possibly the same fig?
Also, do figs mutate easily?

You'll find a couple dozen topics on that one at any fig lover forum, many with lots of cussing and hollering.

There are so many reasons and answers.  Sometimes people just assign names to be different, or to make a variety sound more appealing - you will find a lot of people on fig forums who talk up a certain variety and give it a different name just to make it more sellable.  Others just could care less and name their fig whatever they want, or don't care about names or how bad it is to improperly name something.  Figs may be unknown, so someone assigns a name.  Maybe later they realize it is another variety, but by then both names are known. 

Dunno what else to tell you.

Ciao Balducc,

I think the reason behind this is original names get lost especially when they were alot of them brought to this couuntry so long ago, names get lost, so new names are assigned,  Also, many figs take on specific names in specific places and stick within those areas,  The same fig can be called something completely different 10 miles down the road in some locales, which makes it nice as you can trace a certain variety very easily by its name since that name won't travel far and it will be very easy to know just within a certain mile or kilometer range where it came from exactly. Alot of figs are place names, color names, some taste names, country of origin names, regional names, dialect names, Named after the person which it originated,ect.  I disagree with Jason, I happen to think most of the people on the forum is very very conscientious to the names of fig varieties and we try very hard to keep the records correct on the names of figs, there may be those out there who intentionally try to change a name to make it sound more sellable, but I haven't noticed it on the forum amongst most of us.  Many people will add the synonyms of a particular variety to keep confusion down.   

i would agree that anyone who generates new names does fig collectors a disservice. the only exception, of course, is when there is a new variety.