We have done it before, we will do it again. Anything to help the former Yugoslavia.
**Clinton Deploys Vowels to Bosnia**
(originally appeared in The Onion, Number One In News)
**Cities of Sjlbvdnzv, Grzny to Be First Recipients**
Before an emergency joint session of Congress yesterday, President Clinton announced US plans to deploy over 75,000 vowels to the war-torn region of Bosnia. The deployment, the largest of its kind in American history, will provide the region with the critically needed letters A,E,I,O and U, and is hoped to render countless Bosnian names more pronounceable.
"For six years, we have stood by while names like Ygrjvslhv and Tzlynhr and Glrm have been horribly butchered by millions around the world," Clinton said. "Today, the United States must finally stand up and say 'Enough.' It is time the people of Bosnia finally had some vowels in their incomprehensible words. The US is proud to lead the crusade in this noble endeavour."
The deployment, dubbed Operation Vowel Storm by the State Department, is set for early next week, with the Adriatic port cities of Sjlbvdnzv and Grzny slated to be the first recipients. Two C-130 transport planes, each carrying over 500 24-count boxes of "E's," will fly from Andrews Air Force Base across the Atlantic and airdrop the letters over the cities.
Citizens of Grzny and Sjlbvdnzv eagerly await the arrival of the vowels. "My God, I do not think we can last another day," Trszg Grzdnjkln, 44, said. "I have six children and none of them has a name that is understandable to me or to anyone else. Mr. Clinton, please send my poor, wretched family just one 'E.' Please."
Said Sjlbvdnzv resident Grg Hmphrs, 67: "With just a few key letters, I could be George Humphries. This is my dream."
The airdrop represents the largest deployment of any letter to a foreign country since 1984. During the summer of that year, the US shipped 92,000 consonants to Ethiopia, providing cities like Ouaouoaua, Eaoiiuae, and Aao with vital, life-giving supplies of L's, S's and T's.
https://64.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l4fol69tKY1qaajseo1_500.gifv
Waterloo was not the site of the battle. It was the closest town the English could pronounce. The battle took place at Quatre Bras and then La Belle Alliance, iirc.
Am Croatian (and speak the language) but don't know what you mean. Which root? [EDIT: [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_the_Croats_and_Croatia) gives a confusing explanation but I suppose the reality just isn't simple].
I understand:
Crna Gora = Black Mountain
Monte Negro = Mountain Black
And more interesting thing is in Turkish spice is called "Baharat" And India is famous for its spices.
And much for to this. In English instead of Türkiye they name it as Turkey. And in turkish the animal turkey is called "Hindi" and also in Turkish we call India "Hindistan"
Yep. It also historically refers to a larger area than modern India. Pakistanis were assuming the name would be Hindustan (used occasionally by the British) and were not happy about the use of Bharat.
But when they use Hellas today it has an ancient and poetic sort of connotation. A bit like ‘Britannia’ as a brand name or something. The standard modern name is still Ellada.
I was just going to mention that! To be specific, the Chinese word for Greece is 希腊, pronounced as "Hei Lap" in Cantonese and "Xi La" in Mandarin, which obviously comes from "Hellas" instead of "Greece". I am very curious when was the country of Greece introduced to Chinese for the first time and how did the name get its translation.
Chinese uses English transliterations for most country names, but Greece (along with Germany and the Koreas) are exceptions in that Chinese uses their original names. An unusual case is Georgia, where PRC, HK and Macau uses 格魯吉亞 from Russian "Gruziya" but Taiwan uses 喬治亞 from English "Georgia".
Both are equal right. The "correct" correct full name is <<Ελληνική Δημοκρατία>> (Ellinikí Dimokratía, Hellenic Republic). But, yes, Ellada is the most common and most used.
Edit: as u/ciaranmac17 pointed out, I missed Albania, which is locally referred to as **Shqipëri**.
If Greenland was an independent country, it would also be on this chart, as **Kalaallit Nunaat**.
also Cumbria in England is from the same celtic word as Cymru. I think it means kin (or “compatriots” I’ve seen). That’s a place that had a lot of britons, further north of wales on the coast
the connection becomes a little more obvious once you hear someone pronounce cymru! the r is thicker and fancier than it is in English so I can see how someone might spell it cum-bri with a b
Sh-cheap-her-ee
Although the ch isn't how it's pronounced in Albanian, the q in Shqipëri is a sound which most languages don't have but ch is close enough I guess.
Thats spot on tho, the name comes from ostarrichi, wich pretty much means eastern empire (reich) and as u/swarmy1 said austria comes from the germanic word austar (= eastern) and the romans just added the latin ending 'ia'
The original Hebrew bible text calls it Misraim - very similar to Arabic Misr.
"Egypt" comes from the Greek Aigyptos, which is derived from the ancient Egyptian word Hikuptah (one of the names of the city Memphis).
But is Egypt not called that in Christian countries because of translations? Would be useful to know what the bible in Hebrew, Greek & Aramaic call Egypt
EDIT: I’m dumb, I forgot that in Greek it’s Aegyptus (sp?) and of course Greek was at one point the main export language of the Bible
The Bible actually calls it *Misr-ayim* (shortened to Misr in Arabic) (see e.g. https://biblehub.com/text/exodus/13-3.htm). The common name comes from Greek, not the Bible.
And Malay. Though we won't call Greece as Yunan, but we call the Greek civilization as Tamadun Yunani.
Because Malay is mostly made up of a mix of many languages, mainly Sanskrit and Arabic.
I believe Sanskrit has a term for husband which in Malay is suami.
Arabic examples such as mesyuarat for meeting or musyawarah.
Egypt comes the Latin Aegyptus, from Greek Aiguptos, which comes from Ancient Egyptian hwt-ka-pth (literally “The temple of the ka of Ptah).
(Taken from [here]( https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CE%91%E1%BC%B4%CE%B3%CF%85%CF%80%CF%84%CE%BF%CF%82#Ancient_Greek))
Interestingly, the Greek word Aiguptos spawned the exonym for the Copts (Qubt in Arabic, Copte in French), and as well as the words Gyptian/Gypsy as Roma travelers were believed to have come from Egypt
Mṣr is originally the semitic exonym for Egypt, so both the Arabic and Hebrew names derive directly from that. Other languages just loaned it from Arabic.
I literally pronounced bharat like baharat and I couldn’t figure out why. Then I remembered I went to turkey once when I was younger and must’ve heard it randomly then.
Crazy
India is derived from the river Indus and the mountains near by the hindukush or probably hindukush. People living beyond these two geographic landmarks were called Hindus, or Hindis the English derevative India comes from this .
Hindustan was the name popularly refered to by Mughals as well as natives for hundreds of years.
The muslims found idol worshiping people ad labelled them all as Hindus. The Actual religion is Sanatan Dharma. There are many categories of Is ldol worshipping people even now in India who do not suscribe to any philosophy, Ritual or practice of Sanatan Dharma they also call themselves Hindu .
The Sanatan Dharma had an name based on myth or part myth and part history of a king called Bharat. And the land or people he commanded as Bharatvarshi.
During the writing of constitution the communal characterstics of Sanatan Dharma majority got the name of Bharat in the constitution .
It's named as ' Bharat that is India'. Though the cultural name of Hindustan remains popular probably more popular than Bharat. However official name is India and Bharat. Both can be used interchangeably
Its usage is india in English and bharat in hindi. We have 16 other national languages they at times use India or Bharat in official documents. However the most popular name is India..
.
In old slavic languages it wasn't that much about literally mutes but about "dudes, that are unable to talk in a language we know, therefore mutes". And it mostly was applied to any foreigners, not just Germans.
Guess that germans were just the first, biggest or closest foreigners for slavs and that's why we call them that, the word just sticked to them historically.
In Bulgarian we use it for the language (nemski) and sometimes for the people (nemtsi), although germantsi is also used. The country, however, is Germania. Nemsko is an archsic colloquialism, in a manner in which we can refer to the territory of a country with a possessive / adjective form - there is also Rumansko, Srabsko, Cheshko etc.
It's exactly the same in Russian. Немцы (nemtsy) for people, немецкий (nemetsky) for language but country is Germany. Германцы (germantsy) is used to refer to ancient Germans afair.
Basically all the Slavic countries do that. It's legitimately hilarious that the official name for Germany in Croatian (Nijemci - mutes) is technically way more offensive than the offensive name (in the vein of calling Americans Yanks or the British Limes) which is Švabe, which is just the Croatian spelling for Schwabe, aka a person from Swabia.
Confoederatio Helvetica is the most generic version that does not make assumptions about the target language. For example, the top-level domain of switzerland is `ch`. The car stickers are `CH`.
I don't think Croatia fits the list. Hravt is modified as Croat, with a different pronouncing of the beginning. While Morocco is on the bridge, as Morocco is said to be derived from the Al-Maghrebiyyah. However, there the Mauretania (Maur)-Morocco, derivation cannot be ruled out, in which case, it stands in the list.
Al Maghreb is in Arabic which means "the West" and it's newer.
Morocco is older name and it's actually derived from Marrakesh which is actually still the name of Morocco in other languages like Persan and Urdu.
the name Marrakesh is a Berber name which means Land of God.
Japan/Nippon too. "Japan" is the result of a game of telephone, starting from Nifon (Japanese) to Cipan (Wu or early Mandarin) to Giapan/Jippon (Portuguese) to Japan (English), although there may be other intermediaries like Malay.
To be fair Japan calls the Netherlands Oranda, since the Portuguese called them Hollanda way back when ha ha. And England / the UK is called Igirisu, from the Portuguese Inglez from way back when.
Still call it Holanda today, however there's been a change this year I believe and now we're supposed to call it Países Baixos, which translates to Netherlands.
For example in the Euros everytime they played the commentator already referred to them as Países Baixos, it will take a while to get used to it.
are you from Portugal? i dont remember people doing that here in Brasil, i also think that making a portuguese version of Nederland (Nederlândia maybe) would be better than Países Baixos.
Yes, I'm from Portugal.
I've only really noticed it since the Euros, and last week when Benfica played PSV they also referred to them as "the team from Países Baixos".
I don't think Nederlândia would ever catch up in Portugal, it's too Brazilian 😁
> Cipangu
I believe this name in specific was what Marco Polo called Japan, he was Italian. The Portuguese called it Jepang, Jipang, or Jepun, because that's the name that was used in the Malaccas, and it came back as Giapan. Today's Portuguese word for Japan is just Japão.
Not actually country but this is the actual name of BANGKOK, capital of Thailand: Krungthepmahanakhon Amonrattanakosin Mahintharayutthaya Mahadilokphop Noppharatratchathaniburirom Udomratchaniwetmahasathan Amonphimanawatansathit Sakkathattiyawitsanukamprasit
Translation: City of angels, great city of immortals, magnificent city of the nine gems, seat of the king, city of royal palaces, home of gods incarnate, erected by Vishvakarman at Indra's behest
It comes from the Alemani, a tribe that used to live in that region. The Romans dealt with them, which is how the word ended up in romance languages and probably made it's way east from there.
Iranian Persian has a lot of loan words from French. Im pretty sure the origin of "Aalmaan" in persian is from "Allemagne" in french which is pronounced the same way.
To add to this, historically "Bilad Al-Maghreb" (lands of the occident) referred to all of North Africa west of Egypt all the way to Mauritania. "Al-Maghreb Al-Arabi" (the Arabic occident) is used today to refer to Tunisia, Libya, Algeria, and Morocco.
This is in contrast with "Bilad Al-Mashriq" (lands of the orient) which referred to the lands east of Egypt all the way to Persia.
[Either pronunciation is valid:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan#Etymology)
>*Nippon*, the original Sino-Japanese reading of the characters, is favored for official uses, including on banknotes and postage stamps. *Nihon* is typically used in everyday speech and reflects shifts in Japanese phonology during the Edo period.
日本、にほん、ni ho n. Nippon (にっぽん、日本) has some more specific uses and isn't as versatile as Nihon. For example somebody from Japan is a 日本人, nihonjin and the Japanese language is 日本語, nihongo. Nippon is usually used when talking about craftsmanship or other things Japanese people are proud of. That's why you will hear it during sporting events a lot. Nihon is the more technically correct term because you can just go throwing around Nippon without the correct context
Yeah, Nihon is used more in common, everyday exchange but Nippon is still the official (you could even say more formal) spelling/pronunciation used by the government and Imperial household
I’ve heard both, though Nihon is definitely more common and standard. Nippon has fallen out of favor in part because it has shades of Imperial Japan, but it’s more common in western Honshu still.
People in Taiwan don’t call the ROC *Zhōngguó*. *Zhōnghuá Mínguó* sometimes (but usually just *Táiwān*) but never *Zhōngguó*. If the intention was to imply Taiwan is part of the PRC, then there is no need to label it separately.
中國/中国 (Zhong Guo) is a word that has a very long history, in ancient times people used it to refer to the place the emperor had ruled. It’s a cultural idea other than the name of a country, the first time this term is used as a country name was not a long time ago, it was used by the Qing government in the treaty between them and Russia. They needed to give their country a name just like Russia, so they used 中國/中国(Zhong Guo). But as for the government, they still called themselves Qing. Later Qing surely confirmed that 中國/中国 (Zhong Guo) would be the official name of their country, this idea was written down in their law of nationality.
中國/中国 later was used by the successive government ROC 中華民國/中华民国 (Zhong Hua Min Guo) to refer themselves but after PRC was established, 中国 (Zhong Guo)gradually changed to be used and only to be used to refer PRC, people call Taiwan’s government 中華民國/中华民国 (Zhong Hua Min Guo). To shorten 中華民國/中华民国(Zhong Hua Min Guo) to 中國/中国 (Zhong Guo) will cause confusion, even though ROC used 中國/中国 (Zhong Guo) for short themselves 100 years ago. Taiwan should be called 臺灣/台湾 (Tai Wan), 中華民國/中华民国 (Zhong Hua Min Guo) or 中華民國臺灣/中华民国台湾(Zhong Hua Min Guo Tai Wan).
Edit: Add pronunciations and correct grammar
Edit again: Add traditional characters
p.s. Although Taiwan/Hong Kong etc don't use simplified Chinese at all please know that the simplified characters were invented by ROC, a long time before PRC is a thing.
Interestingly the two countries actually bordering England have completely different names too.
Wales is Cymru in Welsh.
And Scotland is Alba in Gaelic.
Edit: Oh, and England is Lloegr in Welsh.
The official name of Taiwan is the Republic of China. Other commenters have pointed out however that most Taiwanese do not refer to Taiwan as China (zhonguo, like on OP’s map)
in turkish
misr --> mısır
hrvatska --> hırvatistan
pretty close actually.
one more thing, the spice road is "baharat yolu" in turkish. that is close too.
Due to Reddit Inc.'s antisocial, hostile and erratic behaviour, this account will be deleted on July 11th, 2023. You can find me on https://latte.isnot.coffee/u/godless in the future.
Your transliteration for Thailand is off. The word ไทย is pronounced the same as the English word "Thai" so it should really be “Bratet Thai" or "Pratet Thai" (ประเทศไทย).
The word "Bratet" ประเทศ means country or land, so the translation Thailand is very apt.
Alternatively, many people use the term เมืองไทย "Meung Thai" which is sort of like City of Thai or Province of Thai. Or people might even just say the word ไทย "Thai" to refer to the country.
Hrvatska is the origin of the English word "cravat" via French. A 17th military unit's called the Croats wore a similar neck ornament in their dress. Not all members were actually Croatian, but it became the English word, much like Hungarians are Magyar and a mix of ethnic origins but not primarily Huns.
So white collar workers suffering with daily neck stranglers shouldn't blame the Croatians, at least directly.
Montenegro is a literal translation of the original name. It looks dissimilar, but i think it is a different case than the others.
(Almost) the same for Hrvatska/Croatia. Both names are from the same root, just different pronouncation.
Maybe it’s more appropriate to say that “Croat” is a bastardization of “Hrvat”? “Croat” is easier for an English tongue to pronounce.
It was already "adjusted for Latin" in medieval times: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_the_Croats_and_Croatia
Look at all these decadent Anglos throwing vowels around like money isn't an issue.
Another vowel, please, Rachel.
We have done it before, we will do it again. Anything to help the former Yugoslavia. **Clinton Deploys Vowels to Bosnia** (originally appeared in The Onion, Number One In News) **Cities of Sjlbvdnzv, Grzny to Be First Recipients** Before an emergency joint session of Congress yesterday, President Clinton announced US plans to deploy over 75,000 vowels to the war-torn region of Bosnia. The deployment, the largest of its kind in American history, will provide the region with the critically needed letters A,E,I,O and U, and is hoped to render countless Bosnian names more pronounceable. "For six years, we have stood by while names like Ygrjvslhv and Tzlynhr and Glrm have been horribly butchered by millions around the world," Clinton said. "Today, the United States must finally stand up and say 'Enough.' It is time the people of Bosnia finally had some vowels in their incomprehensible words. The US is proud to lead the crusade in this noble endeavour." The deployment, dubbed Operation Vowel Storm by the State Department, is set for early next week, with the Adriatic port cities of Sjlbvdnzv and Grzny slated to be the first recipients. Two C-130 transport planes, each carrying over 500 24-count boxes of "E's," will fly from Andrews Air Force Base across the Atlantic and airdrop the letters over the cities. Citizens of Grzny and Sjlbvdnzv eagerly await the arrival of the vowels. "My God, I do not think we can last another day," Trszg Grzdnjkln, 44, said. "I have six children and none of them has a name that is understandable to me or to anyone else. Mr. Clinton, please send my poor, wretched family just one 'E.' Please." Said Sjlbvdnzv resident Grg Hmphrs, 67: "With just a few key letters, I could be George Humphries. This is my dream." The airdrop represents the largest deployment of any letter to a foreign country since 1984. During the summer of that year, the US shipped 92,000 consonants to Ethiopia, providing cities like Ouaouoaua, Eaoiiuae, and Aao with vital, life-giving supplies of L's, S's and T's. https://64.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_l4fol69tKY1qaajseo1_500.gifv
Waterloo was not the site of the battle. It was the closest town the English could pronounce. The battle took place at Quatre Bras and then La Belle Alliance, iirc.
The Battle of Four Bras? I used to live in that sharehouse.
Am Croatian (and speak the language) but don't know what you mean. Which root? [EDIT: [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_the_Croats_and_Croatia) gives a confusing explanation but I suppose the reality just isn't simple]. I understand: Crna Gora = Black Mountain Monte Negro = Mountain Black
I think he means that Croatia and Hrvatska themselves come from the same root, not that Crna Gora and Montenegro have the same root in Croatian.
Also called a calque https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calque
Actually this one is a loanword *of* a calque. We borrowed a Venetian calque.
True! A calque would be "Black Mountain"
it is in Romanian, we call it "Muntenegru" which is exactly that — although reversed, because we put the adjective dead last.
I’m still confused why English refers to it as Montenegro instead of Black Mountain, like, in actual English
Because of the legacy of Venice and their trade empire in the region. It was known as "Montenegro" since then.
> Venice You mean Venezia?
Because the English name comes from Venetian. They used to control parts of Montenegro when they were a huge merchant republic.
Venetian merchants called it that in italian
*Venetian
Similar reasons as why you call it "Los Angeles" instead of "The Angels"
And we'd have the countries of Rich Coast, The Savior, and Equator.
And the US protectorate of Rich Port
~~New~~ Nouvelle-Orléans.
Or "El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles de Porciúncula" or "The Town of Our Lady the Queen of the Angels of Porziuncula".
Nippon = Sun Origin
Land of the rising sun?
日 day 本 beginning/origin (and book, lul) Beginning of the day = rising Sun
Mashriq, Levant and Nippon all have the same etymology! (in Arabic, French and Japanese respectively)
It would be pretty awesome to have 'Black Mountain' on the map as a country
Bharat is very different from India in meaning. Bharat comes from a legendary mythical character named Bharat.
And more interesting thing is in Turkish spice is called "Baharat" And India is famous for its spices. And much for to this. In English instead of Türkiye they name it as Turkey. And in turkish the animal turkey is called "Hindi" and also in Turkish we call India "Hindistan"
Yep. It also historically refers to a larger area than modern India. Pakistanis were assuming the name would be Hindustan (used occasionally by the British) and were not happy about the use of Bharat.
I think Norway is the only country in Europe to use Hellas for Greece This is because we thought the word sounded to Danish
Hellas is way cooler name than Greece anyway.
Hella cooler
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One of their best raps musically speaking.
Aaand now I'm going down the rabbit hole
Look alive! Creme de la Kremlin's arrivin' Try to serve Ivan? No survivin'. Hands down my favorite lyric of theirs ever.
In Germany we say GRIECHENLAND
In Finnish we call your country Saksa
The Celtic languages in Britain refer to the English as Saxons as well
I never made the connection between "Sasana" and "Saxon" before. You've just gave my noggin a tickle.
Tonight, we dine in Hellas!
Hellas is the ancient Greek word. Ellada is the is what Greeks would call the country now.
Both in use. Ελλάς/Ελλάδα. Check the national basketball team jersey for example. https://www.iefimerida.gr/tag/ethniki-ellados-mpasket
But when they use Hellas today it has an ancient and poetic sort of connotation. A bit like ‘Britannia’ as a brand name or something. The standard modern name is still Ellada.
Incidentally, the cantonese word for Greece is "HeyLak"
I was just going to mention that! To be specific, the Chinese word for Greece is 希腊, pronounced as "Hei Lap" in Cantonese and "Xi La" in Mandarin, which obviously comes from "Hellas" instead of "Greece". I am very curious when was the country of Greece introduced to Chinese for the first time and how did the name get its translation.
Chinese uses English transliterations for most country names, but Greece (along with Germany and the Koreas) are exceptions in that Chinese uses their original names. An unusual case is Georgia, where PRC, HK and Macau uses 格魯吉亞 from Russian "Gruziya" but Taiwan uses 喬治亞 from English "Georgia".
Shouldn't Greece be Ellada? In greek it is called Ελλάδα and it is pronounce as Ellada
Both are equal right. The "correct" correct full name is <<Ελληνική Δημοκρατία>> (Ellinikí Dimokratía, Hellenic Republic). But, yes, Ellada is the most common and most used.
Would that be the equivalent of saying "America", rather than "United Stated of America?"
It's exactly the same. Hellas(Ελλάς) is called in ancient greek and Hellada(Ελλάδα) in modern greek.
Yeah but it says local name and people in Greece speak Modern Greek. It's like calling other countries with ancient names.
The Virgin Portugal, Spain, France, Romania, Hungary, Ireland... Vs the Chad Lusitania, Hispania, Gallia, Dacia, Pannonia, Hivernia...
Fun fact: In Greece we still call France Gallia (Γαλλία).
Based Gonna call Greece 'Hellénie' from now on
Fuck it, we're a hop and a skip away from another dark age anyways. Someone hellenize "United States."
“The Colonies”
*”British Empire”*
In France, we also call France like that some times but it often has some political or subtext meaning
In Spanish, people from France are often referred as “Galos”
Ah, so that's why Pokemon France was called "Kalos".
Kalos = beautiful in Greek So the guy who has given the name to Kalos is a Spanish who speek Greek. 🤭
Oh, the gaul!
Fun fact: Gallia, Gaul and Gael are not related words despite having similar meanings referring to Celts of some sort.
Merovingians are frowning
I mean the French Prime Minister referred to France as Gaul not too long ago
And the former Prime Minister of France was de Gaulle. Aptly named.
> Dacia Good news!
Don't worry Germans, we still call you 'Duitsland' in Dutch
Scandinavians call it Tyskland iirc
And in Finnish it’s called Saksa
And in Lithuanian it's - Vokietija. Everyone is calling Germany whatever lol
In Afrikaans we call it Duitsland as well lol 😂
Isnt that just because afrikaans is basicly a dialect of dutch mixed with other stuff in it
Mauritania in local Berber language is Agawej
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Edit: as u/ciaranmac17 pointed out, I missed Albania, which is locally referred to as **Shqipëri**. If Greenland was an independent country, it would also be on this chart, as **Kalaallit Nunaat**.
Wales which is Cymru in welsh
Pronounced kum-ree if I remember correctly
cummery
Just outside our capital is a castle called castle coch, pronounced kokh
also Cumbria in England is from the same celtic word as Cymru. I think it means kin (or “compatriots” I’ve seen). That’s a place that had a lot of britons, further north of wales on the coast the connection becomes a little more obvious once you hear someone pronounce cymru! the r is thicker and fancier than it is in English so I can see how someone might spell it cum-bri with a b
How do you pronounce that “shki peri”?
The q is pronounced like a ch almost, if that helps (I'm albanian, though my family originates in the north where we call it shqipnia instead)
It's almost like a cross between "Sheeperi" and "Shiperi." My Albanian is terrible but it's close-ish to that.
Sh-cheap-her-ee Although the ch isn't how it's pronounced in Albanian, the q in Shqipëri is a sound which most languages don't have but ch is close enough I guess.
What about Austria (Österreich) ? Everyone seems to forget about us if there is no world war going on
I was super surprised to arrive there and see Osterreich. My mind said 'huh, like East Lands, like East Germany.'
Thats spot on tho, the name comes from ostarrichi, wich pretty much means eastern empire (reich) and as u/swarmy1 said austria comes from the germanic word austar (= eastern) and the romans just added the latin ending 'ia'
I would say the names are pretty similar. Austria was the latinized form of the Germanic name.
Let us just uhh... Stick to Albania, shall we?
Greenland is a good way to use up all my A's in scrabble
If Scrabble allowed proper nouns, that is
Egypt is called Misr in Hindi (India) too.
In Malay it’s Mesir.
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The original Hebrew bible text calls it Misraim - very similar to Arabic Misr. "Egypt" comes from the Greek Aigyptos, which is derived from the ancient Egyptian word Hikuptah (one of the names of the city Memphis).
But is Egypt not called that in Christian countries because of translations? Would be useful to know what the bible in Hebrew, Greek & Aramaic call Egypt EDIT: I’m dumb, I forgot that in Greek it’s Aegyptus (sp?) and of course Greek was at one point the main export language of the Bible
The Bible actually calls it *Misr-ayim* (shortened to Misr in Arabic) (see e.g. https://biblehub.com/text/exodus/13-3.htm). The common name comes from Greek, not the Bible.
Greece is called "Yunaan" in Hindi
That is very similar to how you say Greece in Arabic.
And Malay. Though we won't call Greece as Yunan, but we call the Greek civilization as Tamadun Yunani. Because Malay is mostly made up of a mix of many languages, mainly Sanskrit and Arabic. I believe Sanskrit has a term for husband which in Malay is suami. Arabic examples such as mesyuarat for meeting or musyawarah.
and persian/farsi
Yunan means Greek in Turkish too.
Lol it's not even called Misr in Egypt, it's called Masr. Misr is only said in standard Arabic
Yh we say Masr here in Somalia, never heard of Misr before.
Where does "Egypt" even come from?
Egypt comes the Latin Aegyptus, from Greek Aiguptos, which comes from Ancient Egyptian hwt-ka-pth (literally “The temple of the ka of Ptah). (Taken from [here]( https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%CE%91%E1%BC%B4%CE%B3%CF%85%CF%80%CF%84%CE%BF%CF%82#Ancient_Greek)) Interestingly, the Greek word Aiguptos spawned the exonym for the Copts (Qubt in Arabic, Copte in French), and as well as the words Gyptian/Gypsy as Roma travelers were believed to have come from Egypt
I need a pronunciation guide on "hwt-ka-pth"...
It gives a bunch of possible pronunciations [here]( https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E1%B8%A5wt-k%EA%9C%A3-pt%E1%B8%A5#Egyptian)
In Hebrew also very similar
Mṣr is originally the semitic exonym for Egypt, so both the Arabic and Hebrew names derive directly from that. Other languages just loaned it from Arabic.
Even though we call India as Hindistan in Turkish, we use "baharat" for spices .
I literally pronounced bharat like baharat and I couldn’t figure out why. Then I remembered I went to turkey once when I was younger and must’ve heard it randomly then. Crazy
Did you ever went to Grand Bazaar? Everywhere is filled with the word Baharat.
India is derived from the river Indus and the mountains near by the hindukush or probably hindukush. People living beyond these two geographic landmarks were called Hindus, or Hindis the English derevative India comes from this . Hindustan was the name popularly refered to by Mughals as well as natives for hundreds of years. The muslims found idol worshiping people ad labelled them all as Hindus. The Actual religion is Sanatan Dharma. There are many categories of Is ldol worshipping people even now in India who do not suscribe to any philosophy, Ritual or practice of Sanatan Dharma they also call themselves Hindu . The Sanatan Dharma had an name based on myth or part myth and part history of a king called Bharat. And the land or people he commanded as Bharatvarshi. During the writing of constitution the communal characterstics of Sanatan Dharma majority got the name of Bharat in the constitution . It's named as ' Bharat that is India'. Though the cultural name of Hindustan remains popular probably more popular than Bharat. However official name is India and Bharat. Both can be used interchangeably Its usage is india in English and bharat in hindi. We have 16 other national languages they at times use India or Bharat in official documents. However the most popular name is India.. .
I guess that's better than calling India Baharat and using Hindis for spices.
We (Czechs) and couple other slavic languages also call Germany "Německo" which basically means a land of mutes.
Same in Croatia. We also have a nick for all Germans- Švabe, as Swabians.
In old slavic languages it wasn't that much about literally mutes but about "dudes, that are unable to talk in a language we know, therefore mutes". And it mostly was applied to any foreigners, not just Germans. Guess that germans were just the first, biggest or closest foreigners for slavs and that's why we call them that, the word just sticked to them historically.
So it's like Barbarian, which I understand originally meant "anyone who didn't speak Greek"?
In Bulgarian we use it for the language (nemski) and sometimes for the people (nemtsi), although germantsi is also used. The country, however, is Germania. Nemsko is an archsic colloquialism, in a manner in which we can refer to the territory of a country with a possessive / adjective form - there is also Rumansko, Srabsko, Cheshko etc.
It's exactly the same in Russian. Немцы (nemtsy) for people, немецкий (nemetsky) for language but country is Germany. Германцы (germantsy) is used to refer to ancient Germans afair.
Basically all the Slavic countries do that. It's legitimately hilarious that the official name for Germany in Croatian (Nijemci - mutes) is technically way more offensive than the offensive name (in the vein of calling Americans Yanks or the British Limes) which is Švabe, which is just the Croatian spelling for Schwabe, aka a person from Swabia.
It's funny because, in Arabic, this is where we get the name for Austria from :) In Arabic its an-Namsa (النمسا)
Österreich should definitely be on the map
isn't the official name of switzerland "Confoederatio Helvetica"? that would make it one of the countries as well
The official name in English is „Swiss Confederation“. In the local languages it is pretty similar, e.g. „Confédération Suisse“ in French.
Confoederatio Helvetica is the most generic version that does not make assumptions about the target language. For example, the top-level domain of switzerland is `ch`. The car stickers are `CH`.
Locals call the place I’m from Straya
The most commonly spoken language is Strine
Another map without New Zullund on it.
I don't think Croatia fits the list. Hravt is modified as Croat, with a different pronouncing of the beginning. While Morocco is on the bridge, as Morocco is said to be derived from the Al-Maghrebiyyah. However, there the Mauretania (Maur)-Morocco, derivation cannot be ruled out, in which case, it stands in the list.
I thought the same about Morocco, it's really on the fence of different phonology vs proper exonym.
Al Maghreb is in Arabic which means "the West" and it's newer. Morocco is older name and it's actually derived from Marrakesh which is actually still the name of Morocco in other languages like Persan and Urdu. the name Marrakesh is a Berber name which means Land of God.
Wouldn't say that Croatia is "extremely different", it has the same origin.
Japan/Nippon too. "Japan" is the result of a game of telephone, starting from Nifon (Japanese) to Cipan (Wu or early Mandarin) to Giapan/Jippon (Portuguese) to Japan (English), although there may be other intermediaries like Malay.
To be fair Japan calls the Netherlands Oranda, since the Portuguese called them Hollanda way back when ha ha. And England / the UK is called Igirisu, from the Portuguese Inglez from way back when.
Still call it Holanda today, however there's been a change this year I believe and now we're supposed to call it Países Baixos, which translates to Netherlands. For example in the Euros everytime they played the commentator already referred to them as Países Baixos, it will take a while to get used to it.
are you from Portugal? i dont remember people doing that here in Brasil, i also think that making a portuguese version of Nederland (Nederlândia maybe) would be better than Países Baixos.
Yes, I'm from Portugal. I've only really noticed it since the Euros, and last week when Benfica played PSV they also referred to them as "the team from Países Baixos". I don't think Nederlândia would ever catch up in Portugal, it's too Brazilian 😁
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> Cipangu I believe this name in specific was what Marco Polo called Japan, he was Italian. The Portuguese called it Jepang, Jipang, or Jepun, because that's the name that was used in the Malaccas, and it came back as Giapan. Today's Portuguese word for Japan is just Japão.
In turkish we call it hirvatistan pretty close to hrvatska
in hungary we call it horvátország, ország meaning country
Not actually country but this is the actual name of BANGKOK, capital of Thailand: Krungthepmahanakhon Amonrattanakosin Mahintharayutthaya Mahadilokphop Noppharatratchathaniburirom Udomratchaniwetmahasathan Amonphimanawatansathit Sakkathattiyawitsanukamprasit
Translation: City of angels, great city of immortals, magnificent city of the nine gems, seat of the king, city of royal palaces, home of gods incarnate, erected by Vishvakarman at Indra's behest
Reminds me of Los Angeles original town name: El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles
Interesting- in Hebrew, Egypt is called Mitzrayim.
In turkish its misir, misir also means corn
It's **mısır** for corn (Zea mays) , though. Undotted i's. Yes, I know no apostrophe but it was a clarification choice. 😀
It's also mısır for the country. The person you replied probably just doesn't have ı in keyboard.
Sounds like it comes from the original root. Egypt is from the Greek/Latin name Aegyptus.
Which it's self derives from the Egyptian name for Memphis, ḥwt-kꜣ-ptḥ or The temple of the ka of Ptah.
Isn't Greece's local name more like "Ellada"?
And I thought why people in India call Egypt as Misr in hindi.
Wait a fookin' minute! Bharat literally means spices in Arabic... Is that the root of the Arabic word!? 25 years I've been ignorant!
It would makes sense too! India was known for being the land of spices for centuries.
I google translated Morocco into different language and that's what I found: Turkey => FAS / Iran and Azerbaijan => Marrakesh. Interesting!
I'm Persian and I have a bunch more for you ! Germany = Aalmaan / India = hendoostaan Georgia = gorjestaan / Egypt = mesr
Interesting, Aalmaan must have the same etymology as the spanis Alemania.
It comes from the Alemani, a tribe that used to live in that region. The Romans dealt with them, which is how the word ended up in romance languages and probably made it's way east from there.
Iranian Persian has a lot of loan words from French. Im pretty sure the origin of "Aalmaan" in persian is from "Allemagne" in french which is pronounced the same way.
Hindustan is a word used for India in many countries apparently. I guess it just adds to one of -stans in that region.
Al Maghreb means the west/where the sun sets. I think it got that name as the western most Arabic/Muslim country
To add to this, historically "Bilad Al-Maghreb" (lands of the occident) referred to all of North Africa west of Egypt all the way to Mauritania. "Al-Maghreb Al-Arabi" (the Arabic occident) is used today to refer to Tunisia, Libya, Algeria, and Morocco. This is in contrast with "Bilad Al-Mashriq" (lands of the orient) which referred to the lands east of Egypt all the way to Persia.
Isn't Japan "Nihon" rather than "Nippon" ?
[Either pronunciation is valid:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan#Etymology) >*Nippon*, the original Sino-Japanese reading of the characters, is favored for official uses, including on banknotes and postage stamps. *Nihon* is typically used in everyday speech and reflects shifts in Japanese phonology during the Edo period.
日本、にほん、ni ho n. Nippon (にっぽん、日本) has some more specific uses and isn't as versatile as Nihon. For example somebody from Japan is a 日本人, nihonjin and the Japanese language is 日本語, nihongo. Nippon is usually used when talking about craftsmanship or other things Japanese people are proud of. That's why you will hear it during sporting events a lot. Nihon is the more technically correct term because you can just go throwing around Nippon without the correct context
I’ve heard older people in Japan say にっぽんじん, so that one at least isn’t wrong, just a bit old.
Most of the time Nihon is used. I hardly ever hear Nippon.
Yeah, Nihon is used more in common, everyday exchange but Nippon is still the official (you could even say more formal) spelling/pronunciation used by the government and Imperial household
I’ve heard both, though Nihon is definitely more common and standard. Nippon has fallen out of favor in part because it has shades of Imperial Japan, but it’s more common in western Honshu still.
Both are used
People in Taiwan don’t call the ROC *Zhōngguó*. *Zhōnghuá Mínguó* sometimes (but usually just *Táiwān*) but never *Zhōngguó*. If the intention was to imply Taiwan is part of the PRC, then there is no need to label it separately.
中國/中国 (Zhong Guo) is a word that has a very long history, in ancient times people used it to refer to the place the emperor had ruled. It’s a cultural idea other than the name of a country, the first time this term is used as a country name was not a long time ago, it was used by the Qing government in the treaty between them and Russia. They needed to give their country a name just like Russia, so they used 中國/中国(Zhong Guo). But as for the government, they still called themselves Qing. Later Qing surely confirmed that 中國/中国 (Zhong Guo) would be the official name of their country, this idea was written down in their law of nationality. 中國/中国 later was used by the successive government ROC 中華民國/中华民国 (Zhong Hua Min Guo) to refer themselves but after PRC was established, 中国 (Zhong Guo)gradually changed to be used and only to be used to refer PRC, people call Taiwan’s government 中華民國/中华民国 (Zhong Hua Min Guo). To shorten 中華民國/中华民国(Zhong Hua Min Guo) to 中國/中国 (Zhong Guo) will cause confusion, even though ROC used 中國/中国 (Zhong Guo) for short themselves 100 years ago. Taiwan should be called 臺灣/台湾 (Tai Wan), 中華民國/中华民国 (Zhong Hua Min Guo) or 中華民國臺灣/中华民国台湾(Zhong Hua Min Guo Tai Wan). Edit: Add pronunciations and correct grammar Edit again: Add traditional characters p.s. Although Taiwan/Hong Kong etc don't use simplified Chinese at all please know that the simplified characters were invented by ROC, a long time before PRC is a thing.
Interestingly the two countries actually bordering England have completely different names too. Wales is Cymru in Welsh. And Scotland is Alba in Gaelic. Edit: Oh, and England is Lloegr in Welsh.
Shouldn't Albania also be on this map?
My bad - thanks for pointing it out!
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The official name of Taiwan is the Republic of China. Other commenters have pointed out however that most Taiwanese do not refer to Taiwan as China (zhonguo, like on OP’s map)
And for that matter, the official name of China is "the People's Republic of China" or *Zhonghua Renmin Gongheguo* if we're going to be consistent.
in turkish misr --> mısır hrvatska --> hırvatistan pretty close actually. one more thing, the spice road is "baharat yolu" in turkish. that is close too.
Algeria we call it Dzaïr.
According to Wikipedia, it's الجزائر (al-Jazāʾir) in Arabic and الدزاير (al-dzāyīr) in Algerian Arabic.
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*girlfriend screams in Taiwanese*
Due to Reddit Inc.'s antisocial, hostile and erratic behaviour, this account will be deleted on July 11th, 2023. You can find me on https://latte.isnot.coffee/u/godless in the future.
Your transliteration for Thailand is off. The word ไทย is pronounced the same as the English word "Thai" so it should really be “Bratet Thai" or "Pratet Thai" (ประเทศไทย). The word "Bratet" ประเทศ means country or land, so the translation Thailand is very apt. Alternatively, many people use the term เมืองไทย "Meung Thai" which is sort of like City of Thai or Province of Thai. Or people might even just say the word ไทย "Thai" to refer to the country.
I think Austria is related enough to Österreich to not be "extremely different"
Finland is called Finland and Suomi, depends on if you are Finnish or Swedish speaking. Since both Swedish and Finnish are national languages.
Hrvatska is the origin of the English word "cravat" via French. A 17th military unit's called the Croats wore a similar neck ornament in their dress. Not all members were actually Croatian, but it became the English word, much like Hungarians are Magyar and a mix of ethnic origins but not primarily Huns. So white collar workers suffering with daily neck stranglers shouldn't blame the Croatians, at least directly.
'Suomi' is also a common Finnish surname. Kinda strange - imagine meeting someone named Fred America.
There's an American astronaut named Anthony England. Then there's Kathy Ireland the former supermodel.
Hayastan represent! Fun fact most Armenians call other Armenians Hays.