The common name, taipan, was coined by anthropologist Donald Thomson after the word used by the Wik-Mungkan Aboriginal people of central Cape York Peninsula, Queensland, Australia.

The oft-quoted meaning "sharp-tailed" (based on a confusion with οὐρά, oura, "tail", and Latin anus) is both etymologically and morphologically incorrect.

Members of this genus are considered to be among the most venomous snakes in the world based on their murine LD50, an indicator of the toxicity on mice.

[10] In 1950, Kevin Budden, an amateur herpetologist, was one of the first people to capture a taipan alive, although he was bitten in the process and died the next day.

Murray writes that Rosendale's condition was so severe that nurses later showed him extracted samples of his own blood that were completely black in colour.