36
votes
Accepted
Why is it called the "Ottoman" Empire in English language?
The explanation seems to be related to the attempted spelling of the Arabic for Osman, which came out as utman or Uthman. From wiktionary.org
From Middle French Ottoman, from post-classical Latin ...
- 38.5k
29
votes
Accepted
What is a "staved" town, like in "Staverton"?
Folk etymology is of little use here. And one Staverton is not necessarily of the same origin of another Staverton. So 'a staved town' is not really 'a staved town'. One Staverton may share its ...
- 80.6k
18
votes
Accepted
What place was called [in Latin] Audomaropolitanus?
Audomaropolitanus is actually the adjectival form, and it means "of Audomaropolis." So you'd want to look for that. Latin Wikipedia identifies it as Saint-Omer, in northern France.
- 1,027
17
votes
Was California named after a Moorish ruler called Queen Calafia?
No, that doesn't seem a likely explanation, not after 750 years of reconquista. The answer is for now: we don't know.
From Wikipedia:
Spanish explorers in the 16th century, when they first ...
- 20.4k
14
votes
Accepted
Since when is the Nile Delta known as "Delta"?
Francis Celora in Delta as a Geographical Concept in Greek literature (login required, 100 free articles / month) notes:
That a stranger who arrives at the mouth of the Nile in times when maps were ...
- 71.9k
14
votes
What was the Gothic language name for Ravenna?
Gothic is mainly preserved in the form of incomplete Bibles, of which the most well known is the Codex Argenteus (now in Uppsala).
Apart from these, there are a few very short texts, most of which are ...
- 5,681
11
votes
Accepted
What was the flower of Empress Taytu?
Ascertaining details in legends might be a good thing. But it is a legend and curiously lacks detail, leaving open a huge space for projections and arbitrary symbols, to be filled by listeners. And ...
- 80.6k
10
votes
Is there ANY relation between Pennsylvania and Transylvania?
Sylvan means "woods.
"Transylvania was first referred to in a Medieval Latin document in 1075 as ultra silvam, meaning "beyond the forest" (ultra meaning "beyond" or "on the far side of" and the ...
MCW♦
- 31.9k
10
votes
How did it happen that countries and cities got different names in different languages?
Q How did it happen that countries and cities got different names in different languages?
This can be re-phrased to "why are there (geographical) exonyms and how do they develop?"
And that ...
- 80.6k
10
votes
What is a "staved" town, like in "Staverton"?
"Stave" is/was the plural of "staff"... "ton" is the root of "town" but the original term meant something closer to "enclosed place".
So it's possible that the name originated from a place that was ...
- 3,183
9
votes
Accepted
What was the name of the region, Somalia, British Somalia or British Somaliland?
Originally English tended to use Somaliland for the region and Italian used Somalia.
The two protectorates or territories were usually called British Somaliland and Italian Somaliland in English, ...
- 2,580
9
votes
Why did the English name of "Pacific Ocean" stick if it has been known by many cultures since ancient times?
This reminds me a bit of the old internet hacker/cracker argument. Originally "hacking" was a word for any generalized kind of computer tinkering, and had largely positive connotations. However, mass ...
- 117k
8
votes
Who decided on the name "Mexico"?
Your question appears to be based upon a false assumption:
As far back as 1590, the Theatrum Orbis Terrarum showed that the northern part of the New World was known as "America Mexicana" (...
- 994
8
votes
Why and when did countries develop long names that include the form of government?
The ancient Roman Republic was referred to as the Senatus PopulusQue Romanus ("The Senate and People of Rome") (abbreviated SPQR) as early as the first century BC, but it is unclear when, if ever, ...
- 3,524
8
votes
What was the largest place to be named after a specific, individual animal (i.e. not a species)?
Ok, this is an answer to the literal question, not the spirit of the question:
The largest place named after an animal is the Tadpole Galaxy as it has a volume in the millions of cubic light years ...
- 8,266
7
votes
What is the origin of the name of Kondofrej, Bulgaria?
In fact, I am deeply convinced that the most probable candidate is Guigues IV, Count of Forez (Comte de Forez):
(there are two numbering schemes for the Forez Counts with the most exact name being ...
- 331
6
votes
Accepted
Which lame moor was the namesake of Rancho Moro Cojo?
The book Historic Spots in California: Fifth Edition
claims the term moro was used to indicate anything black, and
that tradition says that a lame black horse gave the name to this
particular ...
- 38.5k
6
votes
Accepted
Naming of (strategic) hills on a map as numbers (example Hill 60)
As near as I can tell, it is standard Army practice to label hills in an operating area by their height in meters. That means for all those hills you listed, the number is their height. This is ...
- 117k
6
votes
What was the largest place to be named after a specific, individual animal (i.e. not a species)?
HISTORICAL (NAMED) ANIMALS
Alexander the Great, in addition to naming numerous cities after himself, also named cities after his horse, Bucephalus, (example: Alexandria Bucephalous and Phalia), and ...
- 108k
6
votes
Which city has had the most name changes?
Guinness (Book of) World Records lists indeed the Kazakh capital as the capital city with most name changes.
My guess is that lists like Countries And Cities That Have Changed Their Names are sought ...
- 80.6k
5
votes
Who decided on the name "Mexico"?
Mexica is the Nahuatl or "Aztec" name for the original group of "Aztecs." Over the course of several centuries, these "Mexicans" conquered the whole Central Valley of what we now call "Mexico," ...
- 104k
5
votes
Why was Zabrze renamed Hindenburg O.S in 1915?
The decision to rename the place from Zabrze to Hindenburg in 1914/15 was not unique to this "big village".
WP: Belomorskoje:
Belomorskoje (russisch Беломорское, deutsch Hindenburg, bis 1918 Groß ...
- 80.6k
5
votes
Accepted
What is the back story behind the Baja California towns of "Purgatorio" and "Providencia"?
From what I gathered, without knowing which book it was you were reading, both towns appear to have been two mining centers, established by the mining company El Boleo, and they must have just taken ...
- 2,256
5
votes
What is the relationship (if any) between Skøyen and Skøyenåsen in Oslo?
It was two different farms with the same name (Bull, Akers historie, p. 11).
(The map shows the oldest names, from the Bronze age or earlier.)
So Skøyenåsen belonged to Nordre Skøyen in East Aker.
- 2,663
5
votes
What was Sir John Mandeville's source regarding Beersheba and its chronology?
This can't really be reconciled historically, because Abraham was written as a mythological figure, not a historic one.
The Abraham story cannot be definitively related to any specific time,
and it ...
- 117k
5
votes
When did the United Kingdom become "United" rather than merely united? (I.e., that word became part of its name.)
It really goes back to the 1706 Union with Scotland Act and the corresponding 1707 Union with England Act.
Article I:
That the two Kingdoms of England and Scotland shall upon the First day of May ...
- 4,942
4
votes
What was the name of the region, Somalia, British Somalia or British Somaliland?
The earliest relevant usage in any English language source that I could confirm via Google Books was Somaliland in 1783. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, the term Somalia dates to 1814 ...
- 18.3k
4
votes
Accepted
Why is Hue's "Purple Forbidden City" so called?
It is a literal translation of the Sino-Vietnamese phrase "Tử cấm thành": Tử means Purple, Cấm means Forbidden, and Thành means City. "Purple" here refers to the Purple Forbidden enclosure, a group of ...
- 56
4
votes
Accepted
Who decided on the name "Mexico"?
I finally found this question addressed in Timothy Anna's Forging Mexico (Nebraska, 1998), pp. 36-40.
Tenochtitlán dominated the center of Mesoamerica for a century before the arrival of Spaniards, ...
- 27.6k
4
votes
What was the flower of Empress Taytu?
Though mostly recent works,several published books claim it was the bloom of the Mimosa Tree, also known as the Persian Silk Tree.
(image from The Mimosa Tree Complete Guide)
From the book
Ethiopia ...
- 38.5k
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