According to the United Nations, there are 195 independent countries in the world with an autonomous government. We are sure you have heard their names more than once, but, do you know what those names mean? Here is a list of some of the most interesting meanings behind the name of these European countries and… Mexico:
England
This name comes from the prefix “Engla,” which literally means “the land of the Angles.” The Angles, “people of Angul,” were a Teutonic tribe that settled in a region called like this for its hook-like shape. The name might also refer to fishing (with hooks) as a main activity of the people.
Germany
Originally known as Deutschland (land of the people), the name Germany might derive from the Germanic tribes known as “germani” who settled in the banks of the Rhine River centuries before our era. Presumably, the word “germani” comes from Old Irish garim, which means “noisy”, or gair, “neighbor.”
France
The name comes from the coalition of Germanic tribes known as Franks, which derives from a Germanic word meaning “free”. It is thought that this was used to mean that these tribes were free of taxation.
Belgium
The name comes from the ethnic name Belgae, a cluster of tribes that inhabited the area between the rivers Seine and Rhine at the time of the Roman Empire. The word Belgae seems to come from the root *belg- or *bolg-, meaning “to swell” (particularly with anger). Thus, it would mean, “the People who Swell (particularly with anger/in battle fury)”
Croatia
The origin of the word is highly debated, and many theses have been proposed. However, the most accepted, according to experts, is that it is a derivation from Indo-Aryan xar-va(n)t, which means “feminine, rich in women, ruled by women.”
Portugal
The word Portugal come from the Roman-Celtic place named Portus Cale: Portus, Latin for port or harbour, and Cala or Cailleach, which was the name of a Celtic goddess. Portus Cale was the name of an early settlement located at the mouth of the Douro River which flows into the Atlantic Ocean, north of what is now Portugal.
Albania
Albanians call their land Shqipëri, which is usually translated as “land of the eagles” or “children of the eagles”. The name Albania is probably from preindoeuropean ‘alb’ – hill; or protoindoeuropean ‘albho’ – white.
Macedonia
Originally a Greek word, ‘makedones’ means “land of the tall people” referring to this feature in its population.
Greece
The origin of the name Greece, which literally means “the land of the Greeks,” is highly debated. According to Hesiod, Graecus was the son of Pandora and Zeus and gave his name to the people who followed the Hellenic customs. His brother Latinus gave his name to the Latins. But a modern theory (by German classical historian Georg Busolt), derives it from Graikhos “inhabitant of Graia” (literally “gray,” also “old, withered”), a town on the coast of Boeotia, which was the name given by the Romans to all Greeks.
Turkey
The name Turkiye means “strength”. Although in ancient Persian it could also mean “a beautiful youth,” “a barbarian,” or “a robber.”
Cyprus
The etymology of the name is unknown, but it has been suggested that it could come from the Greek word for the Mediterranean cypress tree, kypárissos, (Cupressus sempervirens); the Greek name of the henna tree, kýpros, (Lawsonia alba); or the Sumerian word for copper (zubar) or for bronze (kubar), from the large deposits of copper ore found on the island. The island has given its name to the Classical Latin word for copper through the word Cuprum.
Italy
The country shaped like a boot owes its name to the latin word Vitulus o Witaloi, “the children of the bull”, and they were named after the tribe Vitali, also related to ‘vitulus’, ‘calf’.
Malta
The origin of the word is unknown, but the most common etymology is that the word Malta is derived from the Greek word ‘meli’, “honey”. The ancient Greeks called the island Melite, meaning “honey-sweet”, possibly for Malta’s unique production of honey. Another conjecture suggests that the word Malta comes from the Phoenician word Maleth, “a haven”, or ‘port’, in reference to Malta’s many bays and coves.
Spain
It may have evolved from the Iberian word Hispalis, meaning “city of the western world.” Another hypothesis argues that the root of the term span is the Phoenician word spy, meaning “to forge metals.” Therefore, i-spn-ya would mean “the land where metals are forged”, and this may be a derivation of the Phoenician I-Shpania, meaning “island of rabbits”, “land of rabbits” or “edge”, a reference to Spain’s location at the end of the Mediterranean.
Kosovo
Kosovo was known as Kosovo Pojle, a Serbian toponym meaning “the land of the blackbird”. In 1389, there was a historical battle in Kosovo Pojle between the army of Ottoman Sultan Murad I and the army of Serbian prince Lazar.
Iceland
A Viking named Flóki Vilgerðarson traveled to what was then called Snæland (Snowland). His daughter had drowned en route and then his livestock starved to death. The sagas say that he climbed a mountain and saw a fjord (Arnarfjörður) full of icebergs, which led him to give the island its new and present name.
Norway
Its ancient name in old norse was ‘norðr’, which meant “the way of the north”, because it was one fo the routes of the ancient vikings.
Serbia
The origin of the name is unclear, but it has been proposed that it could derive from Russian ‘paserb’ (“stepson”), Ukrainian pryserbytysia (“join in”), Old Indic sarbh-(“fight, cut, kill”), Latin sero (“make up, constitute”), and Greek siro (“repeat”).
Scotland
It means “the land of the scoti” but the origin of scoti is unclear. It has been proposed that it comes from Gaelic ‘Sgaothaich’, meaning “crowd” or “horde”; another theory is that it comes from Gaelic Scuit, meaning someone cut-off, as in outcasts. More recently, it has been speculated that it comes from a group of raiders adopting a name from an Indo-European root, *skot meaning “darkness, gloom”. One third theory says that it comes from Old Norse ‘skot’, which means ‘tax.’
Mexico
The name is most probably derived from the nahuatl roots ‘mētz’ (-tli) (‘moon’), xīc (-tli) (‘navel’) and -co (the place where): “In the navel of the moon.”
Mexico is the name used to refer to the capital of the Aztec empire, which was founded on a series of small islands on the lake of Texcoco, which was shaped like a rabbit, just like the rabbit the ancient Mexicans thought lived on the full moon.
Do you know the meaning of the name of your country?
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