Deutschland = Germany = Allemagne = Niemcy

Nippon = Japan

and so on.

Most of the variations can be explained by going back far enough to "us guys" and "you guys." How many variations can we collect?

I don't have any nation names to add but many of the native race names I've heard mean "the people", or to put it in Spartese "us guys".

What are you looking for? What nations are called in different languages?

Sounds like it to me.

Hellas = Greece = Yunani



Bingley

I'm always puzzled by why we in the USA call this place "America," when both North and South America are America! What it was according to people from Aztecs and Algonquins to Zapotecs and Zunis, I'll not likely ever know.

Why the switch from Iran to Persia to Iran?

Sparteye, are you just looking for nation names in different languages, or something more specific, like names which have changed in English? The following url gives European place names, including country names in various languages, and there are no doubt many more such lists. http://www.p.lodz.pl/I35/personal/jw37/EUROPE/europe.html

Rod

I first learned a bit about nation names as a tad, around the time of WWII, when I began collecting stamps, and found that Finland was Suomi, Germany Deutschland, Austria Oesterreich, etc. In the 60s when people had the oval stickers on their cars identifying their country, most of them were obvious, like FR and IT, but I was able to amaze people by telling them why CH was Switzerland -- it stands for Confoederatio Helvetica.

One of the quirkier examples is Holland/the Netherlands. From what I can tell they are synonymous in English. I can't think of another country with two names in English (aside from those that have changed names and are still occasionally referred to by the old one). To add to the fun, the inhabitants of the country are Dutch!

In Italian, Tedesco=German. But I think Germany is "Germania". emanuela?

Bean>>>
In Italian, Tedesco=German. But I think Germany is "Germania". emanuela?

I had a grandfather who was of Spanish descent who always called Germans, "Aleman"



chronist

CH was Switzerland -- it stands for Confoederatio Helvetica.

Why would they name themselves after a type face?

but I was able to amaze people by telling them why CH was Switzerland -- it stands for Confoederatio Helvetica.


Whereas any reader of Asterix© would have yawned and replied, "tell me something I don't know"

One of the quirkier examples is Holland/the Netherlands. From what I can tell they are synonymous in English. I can't think of another country with two names in English

Many of my Dutch friends get annoyed by English speaking people using the name of a province for the name of the country. There is a North Holland and a South Holland, and both are part of the Netherlands. With so many Dutch people here,it has become easy to get into the habit of callign the country by its proper name, and it helps that the people call their language Nederlands. Dutch comes from "Deutsch" I seem to recall reading somewhere.

CH was Switzerland -- it stands for Confoederatio Helvetica
which is interesting (and slightly puzzling) because the modern official Swiss names don't use that form. The official names are: Schweizerische Eidgenossenschaft (German), Confederation Suisse (French), Confederazione Svizzera (Italian).
There is a very interesting museum of all the original documents forming the confederation (1291) and subsequent ones as the various cantons joined. Can't remember the name of the village at the moment (ICLIU). We were at the family chalet for the 700 year celebrations, a tremendous event.

Rod

Why would they name themselves after a type face?

Because they couldn't pronounce Arial.

Muenchen - Munich - Monaco

Monaco - Monte-Carlo

Strange!

Arial; that's a motorcycle, innit?

BY, are you saying that Monaco = Munich in some language? Which is that?
Monte Carlo is the name of the city which just about completely fills the principality of Monaco, they are not quite the same thing.

And talking of smallish countries, I remember an article in Punch when UK was joining the European Economic Community giving salient "facts" about the other member nations. It claimed that Luxembourg had the best weather in Europe mainly because 90% of the country was indoors.

Rod

Munich is Monaco in Italiano (or 'Monaco di Baviera')
In English on the other hand, it's that tiny country east of the French Riviera, where Monte-Carlo lies. Clear, Roger, err, Ron, no Rod. Sike!

Munich is Monaco in Italiano (or 'Monaco di Baviera')

Thanks BY, I hadn't noticed that before. But for some or, more likely, no strange reason Mo'naco (=Monaco) is masculine, but Mo'naco di Baviera = Munich is feminine.

Rod

Wordcrazy-- Re:I had a grandfather who was of Spanish descent who always called Germans, "Aleman"

So you know how to spell that? there is a word-- on the tip of my tongue-- similar to almonds-- almandl??? (related / translated from Mandle-- (as in mandlebrot-- or almond bread-- a german form of what we in US call Biscotti--) that i have heard as a word for german -- It a word i never use-- but recognize it as i hear it spoken by other as "German" -- but i have no idea why Germans would be called almond anything!-- and i can't for the life of me think who uses it!

I believe both Monaco and Monte Carlo are towns in Monaco.

Monaco country and Monaco = Munich = Muenchen are both named after monks. (Well I'm guessing for Munich, on etymology.) The Latin was monachus, which gives Italian monaco. The Old English was munuc, and I'm guessing the Old High German was much the same, giving Munken = '(something of) the monks'.

The Grimaldi family seized Monaco in the 1200s sometime by disguising themselves as monks. I don't know whether it was called Monaco before that.

why Germans would be called almond anything!-- and i can't for the life of me think who uses it!

There are four roots for names of Germans. The Latin and English name is related to the Latin germanus 'related' and presumably germen 'bud, sprout': so probably meant 'kin, confederacy, tribe' and then came to be applied to all the people of Germania. I don't know exactly.

The Spanish aleman and French allemand come from the Allemanni, one of the German tribes during the Roman period. I don't know why their name came to be the name of all Germans. The name is presumably Germanic itself, meaning 'all men'. Perhaps another confederacy name.

The Slavonic names are generally something like nemets. I have a vague recollection this means 'dumb'; the Slavs called themselves the speakers (slovo = 'word') and so anyone not Slavonic-speaking was a non-speaker. Can anyone confirm or correct this?

The most interesting root is the Indo-European teut-, meaning 'people'. As well as giving Teutonic and Dutch and Deutsch, it gives the Irish Tuatha in Tuatha De Danaan, the Italian tedesco which is their word for 'German', and the Old English theod. This didn't survive into modern English but Tolkien readers will recognize it in King Theoden.

There's also the Germanic word folk. This has no known counterpart outside the Germanic languages, and it's been suggested it came from an underlying language that was there before the Indo-Europeans. Someone has even called this hypothetical language "Folkish" on account of that.

Arial; that's a motorcycle, innit?

No, how silly of you! It's Prospero's fairie. Now don't go raising a tempest about it!

Muenchen are both named after monks. (Well I'm guessing for Munich, on etymology.)

Nail on head.

No, how silly of you! It's Prospero's fairie. Now don't go raising a tempest about it!

"The Tempest" Q: Why name a play after something over and done at first curtain?

"The Tempest" Q: Why name a play after something over and done at first curtain?

Because Willie thought that naming it "Prospero's Books" sounded stupid! If Peter Greenaway could have gotten away with it, everyone would have been naked in his film version, and Miranda would have uttered, "Oh, brave nude world that hath such creatures in it!"

Bean: In Italian, Tedesco=German. But I think Germany is "Germania". emanuela?
Yes, you are right. Anyway, wordcrazy, educated people can understand - and maybe find in old poems -
even the form Alemanno = tedesco = german.
Alemanno gives a feeling of fear, I think because centuries ago it was used for german army, arrriving from North and wasting some of our countries..

Russian does use 'Nemets' to mean German or Germanic, and the verb _nemét'_ does mean "to be speechless." Bulgarian, on the other hand, uses /njam/ for 'dumb' but either 'germanski' or 'nemski.'

I'd question whether 'Slavic' comes from slóvo - 'word.' The Russian word for Slav is 'slavianín/slaviánka' (masc./fem.) and 'slaviánskii' for Slavic. The more likely root in my book would be 'sláva' - fame or glory.
Just my dve kopecka.

[oh, and to address Faldage's inquiry about my nom de guerre: slovo - word and voi - (thing)... Think in terms of Russian folk tales about domovoi, dverovoi, dvorovoi, etc. {The house/door/courtyard "thing" that watched over the home and could be source of either solace or mischief, depending on whether one paid the proper respect.}]

Why name a play after something over and done at first curtain?

Ah, one of my favourite plays. Does it actually finish before curtain up? – I seem to remember the first stage direction is something like ‘On a ship at sea – a tempest of thunder and lightning’.

But I can’t help feeling the meaning within the play is deeper than this. The tempests in Shakespeare are always a sort of leitmotif of some other process of wrack and discord in the affairs of mankind. In this play, I think it is underlining the fact that the story starts, not at the opening scene of the play, but 12 years earlier when Prospero is unrightfully evicted from the Dukedom of Milan by his brother’s perfidy. When he tells the story to his daughter Miranda, it’s worth noting that they are cast adrift in an unseaworthy wreck in a storm:

“In few, they harried us aboard a bark;
Bore us some leagues to sea, where they prepared
A rotten carcass of a butt, not rigg’d,
Nor tackle, sail, nor mast – the very rats
Instinctively had quit it. There they hoist us,
To cry to the sea, that roar’d to us…”

(hope I’ve got that about right, no time to check now!)

It’s also got a wider emblematic significance – when P asks Ariel (note not with an ‘a’, I think) how the day’s going, Ariel answers it is the sixth hour “at which time, my lord, you said our work shall cease” to which P responds something like ‘yes, I did say that, when I first rais’d the tempest’. This suggests a reference to rest on the 7th day etc of the creation myth – Prospero as god-figure, eventually setting aside his staff of power.

At the very last scene, P promises his guests “calm seas, auspicious gales,/And sails so expeditious that shall catch/Your royal fleet far off (aside) My Ariel, chick,/That is thy charge. Then to the elements be free…” At this point, we know the tempest is metaphorically blown out.

[shameless name-drop] – at school, I was in a production of this play with Daniel Day Lewis. He was quite good even then

The more likely root in my book would be 'sláva' - fame or glory

I think slov- 'word' and slav- 'glory' are connected: I seem to recall reading something recently (I suspect Lehmann's book on Indo-European) which made the claim. For the vowels, there's the ethnonyms Slovene and Slovak. For the semantic connexion, cf. Greek doxa 'opinion; glory', where the semantic shift is via a common sense 'reputation'.

Afterthought:

I might be confabulating at this point, but I even have an idea that the underlying Slavonic slew- 'speak' is Indo-European klew-, and therefore related to loud and ?listen and Latin cli-ent.

Wow, Aunt mav, your esteem just keeps getting higher and higher, in my eyes!
(Just keep talking that way about Shakespeare, Sweetie, and you may convert me yet--without having to resort to sneakified tactics.)

[shameless name-drop] – at school, I was in a production of this play with Daniel Day Lewis. He was quite good even then

Mav, that is so cool! What part did you play in the production, and what part he?

I was Trinculo (“A murrain on your monster, and the devil take your fingers!”), I think Dan was Ferdinand, getting the girl even in those days! This was much to our chagrin, you understand, because we all felt cheated by the drama teacher hogging the plum role of Prospero. He played with the deus ex machina elements by running the lighting board (the dimmer controls) from on-stage in plain view, which us mere goblins could never quite decide was really cool or rather tacky. Great fun though.

In another production, Dan and I shared the role of Jack in a dramatisation of Lord of the Flies – that got very confusing for the audience, since we swapped roles part way through each performance and did not have significant costuming or other clues to offer signposts! And especially one night when we ‘looped’ the dialogue into what threatened to form an endless spiel, whilst simultaneously rendering the plot incomprehensible by cutting 2 key scenes. I made a suitably gruesome pig’s head on a stick over many weeks in the art department. Otherwise it was a black box experimental kind of production: I can remember exclaiming crossly to my dad around then that “I wished we sometimes did an ordinary play!”. It evidently didn’t cause any problems for Dan, though, and he has been anything but ordinary ever since

oh and I meant to correct my mangled quotes: it should read "hurried" not harried, and "have quit" not 'had quit', which latter one looks odd now I read it again. And the stage direction is actually 'On a ship at sea; a tempestuous noise of thunder and lightning heard' - "Hast thou, spirit, performed to point the tempest that I bade thee?" asks P of Ariel a bit later.

Bugger you.... shameless name dropping ....are you always so lonq-winded? By the time I came to the end of your post, I was quite perplexed as to why you had responded in the first!

Forgive my ineptitude, please, Bingley, but that link seems to bring me to a discussion on pluralism, in which the Jewish historian Josephus figures prominently.

The ineptitude is all mine . For some reason links only seem to work for the top thread on that board. Once I've worked out how to link to threads further down I'll repost the message, and delete my original posting, thus baffling everybody else even more.

Bingley

What I was trying to do earlier was link to the following discussions of the origin of the word "Slav" and its connection with the word "slave". Try http://forums.about.com/ab-ancienthist/messages?msg=1484.1 and a follow up in http://forums.about.com/ab-ancienthist/messages?msg=1493.1 .



Bingley

Bugger you.... shameless name dropping ....are you always so lonq-winded? By the time I came to the end of your post, I was quite perplexed as to why you had responded in the first!

Gatsby, I assume you were talking about maverick. He explained that he was going into further depths with the
meaning of the play.

I am also going to give you the benefit of the doubt, and assume that you haven't read far back enough on this board to be aware that: many of us consider ourselves friends and near-family in a way, and that we treat each other as such. I love maverick, and as far as I am concerned, he can say however much he wants to say. Everything that comes out of his fingertips has been worthwhile in some way.
If I knew but a small portion of the things he knows, I would be much wiser, so I am going to sit back and soak up whatever he offers, and consider myself privileged to do so.