They were called nothing (at least in English) because they were first described somewhere in the 18th century and they knew about electricity by then. Boring answer, but that's how it is.
this post was submitted on 18 Oct 2023
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There were plenty of oral reports of fishermen being overcome by a violent seizure when sorting through a netted catch. They knew which fish it was, they just had no concept of electricity yet. It took a scientist from the Royal Society in London - can't recall his name - to link the fish with electricity, he and his colleagues were astonished that a living creature could biologically produce such an electric discharge as intense as a Leyden Jar (a rudimentary precursor to Volta's invention of the battery as we still know it today).
Volta is a cool name. Sounds like a stage name.
Maybe you could combine it with another name, like "Bruno Volta" or something.
What was the indigenous South American name for them?
The tupi word for it is poraquê, which means "one that makes (one) sleep" or "numbener"
Numbener is my new super hero name.
And his sidekick, Dope.
Fellow South-American (Brazil?) Edit: nickname Brazilian huehue confirmed
Yep. Nothing existed before the 18th century white explorer came along and named everything in English.
Given that the question at hand is limited to the English language, the answer is limited to the English language.
Any names the animal had in other languages will most likely not have changed after electricity was discovered so there will be no change in name there. The joke won't work in most other languages, even if they only discovered out little zappy friends after English speaking people did. In German, the eel is called Zitteraal (twitch-eel), so no need to know what electricity is: "my hand goes twitchy once I touch this slimy sea snake" is enough.
don't you need electricity to log in to the eels twitch stream though?
In German they are called "Zitteraal" literally translated: tremble eel
Named after the people who were trembling on touch.
Shocky boys
Spicy worms
Or numb eel in some places.
Spicy waternoodles
Prior to our understanding of electricity, many believed that electricty-producing animals were injecting some sort of venom.
wow your date can turn invisible, only a man of quality could attract such talent
Snappy snakes.
Angry pool noodles
Eelectric
Magic longfish, obviously.
I was curious and started reading into it, apparently the ancient Egyptians used to call electric fish (as they hadn't discovered electric eels by that point) "Thunderer of the Nile"
"Eels"