Euro state names etymology

Baldewin   Mon Feb 22, 2010 4:33 pm GMT
It appears to be out of use.
Kent and Flanders   Mon Feb 22, 2010 5:18 pm GMT
Like the French and Franks, todays Catalans are not representative of Goths and NEVER HAVE BEEN.

Bavaria is named after Imperialist and Randlord Cecil Boves.
Roland de Francwiche   Mon Feb 22, 2010 5:31 pm GMT
No you lies, Cecil de Boves was a typical ethnic Frenchmann who is of verys pures Frankishe blood who help ours Germnic brothers washing south easting Germany of Slavs immigrants.

France is 80% germanic and 20% celtiques ande famous Germanic Frenchman Jose Boves is a direct decendent of Cecil de Boves/Bavaria and hes have Germanic style mustache. and dis is whys southern germany is names after Frenchmann and whys Germanic nations of France and germany both spellings 'south' 'sud' !!
Raven   Mon Feb 22, 2010 5:35 pm GMT
@"Roland de Francwiche"

Ganja or Tequila ?...
Roland de Francwiche   Mon Feb 22, 2010 6:05 pm GMT
@ Raven

je ne drug dealer pas, and anyway, there is big drug drought at moments and onlys Methadrome for sellings.
Sanna Wlasvolski   Mon Feb 22, 2010 6:28 pm GMT
What is the Galician name for England. Is it also based on the element >Saxon< like the other Celtic land?
* * *   Mon Feb 22, 2010 7:18 pm GMT
"What is the Galician name for England. Is it also based on the element >Saxon< like the other Celtic land?"

Of course not since Galicia has nothing Celtic

(Galicia's Celticness is like Milanese Celticness, just a face saving joke)

Must be something like 'Alemaña' or 'Alemanha'
rep   Mon Feb 22, 2010 7:56 pm GMT
<<What is the Galician name for England>> Inglaterra,of course.
hi   Mon Feb 22, 2010 10:03 pm GMT
What about Russia, which got its name from a Swedish Viking tribe called the Rus, which ruled over some Slavs around Kiev originally and founded the state?
Franco   Mon Feb 22, 2010 10:37 pm GMT
Spain comes from Î-šəpānîm, a Phoenician name which means "land of rabbits".
Baldewin   Tue Feb 23, 2010 5:45 am GMT
Rabbits have indeed been introduced here from Spain. In the past there used to be only hares.
PARISIEN   Tue Feb 23, 2010 9:30 am GMT
<< Rabbits have indeed been introduced here from Spain. In the past there used to be only hares. >>

-- This is interesting. I'd never heard of that.
It would explain why French and Romanian use derivates from the Latin word for "hare" (Fr. 'lapin', Ro. 'lepore') for rabbits.
And in French there is only one word for female hares and female wild rabbits, "hase".
hi   Tue Feb 23, 2010 4:19 pm GMT
Interesting about the origin of Spain's name. Didn't know that. I guess Carthage had a pretty big presence in Iberia at one time. And yeah, come to think of it, Sp., Pt., and It. use conejo, coelho, and coniglio. While Ro. uses iepure for both rabbit and hare, and Fr. uses lapin and lièvre respectively.
PARISIEN   Tue Feb 23, 2010 4:34 pm GMT
<< Sp., Pt., and It. use conejo, coelho, and coniglio >>

... certainly related to Lat. 'cuninculus', which was also transmitted to German ('Kaninchen'), Scandinavian ('kanin'), Dutch ('konijn') and Old English ('Coney').

Current English 'rabbit' seems to be related to words like 'robet', 'robbe' and 'robbette', which are present in various French and German dialects (probably in Dutch too).
ffds   Tue Feb 23, 2010 8:03 pm GMT
Portugal's name derives from the Roman name Portus Cale. Cale was the name of an early settlement located at the mouth of the Douro River, which flows into the Atlantic Ocean in the north of what is now Portugal. Around 200 BC, the Romans took the Iberian Peninsula from the Carthaginians during the Second Punic War, and in the process conquered Cale and renamed it Portus Cale (Port of Cale). During the Middle Ages, the region around Portus Cale became known by the Suevi and Visigoths as Portucale. The name Portucale evolved into Portugale during the 7th and 8th centuries, and by the 9th century, that term was used extensively to refer to the region between the rivers Douro and Minho, the Minho flowing along what would become the northern border between Portugal and Spain. By the 11th and 12th century, Portugale was already referred to as Portugal.

The etymology of the name Cale is mysterious, as is the identity of the town's founders. Some historians have argued that Greeks were the first to settle Cale and that the name derives from the Greek word kallis (καλλις), 'beautiful', referring to the beauty of the Douro valley. Still others have claimed that Cale originated in the language of the Gallaeci people indigenous to the surrounding region (see below). Others argue that Cale[2] is a Celtic name like many others found in the region. The word cale or cala, would mean 'port', an 'inlet' or 'harbour,' and implied the existence of an older celtic harbour.[3] Others argue it is the stem of Gallaecia. Another theory claims it derives from Caladunum.[4]

In any case, the Portu part of the name Portucale became Porto, the modern name for the city located on the site of the ancient city of Cale at the mouth of the Douro River. And Port became the name in English of the wine from the Douro Valley region around Porto. The name Cale is today reflected in Gaia (Vila Nova de Gaia), a city on the left bank of the river.