List of subnational name etymologies

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Here is a collection of the etymology of the names of subnational entities for the convenience of interested reader who then would not have to go into each individual place's article to find out the word origin. (See also: List of country name etymologies, political entities named after people)

  • Egypt
    • Kemt - "land of the black (mud of the Nile, or people)".
  • Netherlands
    • Holland - (Germanic) - 'wooded land' (often incorrectly regarded as meaning 'hollow land')
    • Batavia - (Germanic) - 'arable land'
  • Romania
    • Bessarabia - from Basarab I, Wallachian king who led some expeditions in this land
    • Bukovina - "Buchenland" = "beech land"
    • Dobrogea - "good land"
    • Hateg - "Terra Herzog" = Duke's land
    • Muntenia - from muntean = man of the mountains, from Romanian munte=mountain
    • Oltenia - from the river Olt, called Alutus by the Romans, probably from Latin lutum=clay.
    • Transylvania - "beyond the woods"
      • Ardeal - "wooden hill" - arde is an Indo-European particle meaning forest, the same as in English Forest of Arden and Belgian Ardennes Woods; Deal means hill in Romanian.
    • Wallachia - "land of the foreigners".
  • United Kingdom
    • England - from Engla-lond, the land settled in the early 6th century by various peoples from Low Germany, among them the Angles (Latin Anglii) who originally inhabited the fish-hook shaped territory known as Angeln situated in present-day Schleswig. See Anglo-Saxons.
    • Gibraltar - from Arabic "djebl al-Tarik" -> "Tarik's rock" because this is where the Arabic general Tarik started his conquest of the Iberian peninsula in 711.
    • Northern Ireland - from Old Irish Eriu. Precise meaning uncertain, though could be the name of a prehistoric fertility goddess.
    • Scotland Literally 'Land of the Scots'. The Scottish people were originally 5th Century settlers from Ireland although the name didn't come about until after the 9th Century. Alba, the Gaelic name for Scotland means 'highlands' from the Latin albus or 'white' (describing the mountains). Caledonia, the Latin name means forested highlands
    • Wales - "land of the foreigners", from the Germanic 'welsche' the term used by Anglo-Saxon invaders of the British Isles for the native Celts they encountered. The Welsh native toponym "Cymru" means "fellow countrymen". Several areas in Europe were named by the ancient Germans in the same way, the term used only for places inhabited by peoples of Celtic or Latin descent, including "Wallonia" in Belgium, "Valais" (in Switzerland), Wallachia in Romania and the archaic "Welschenland" a term for Italy.

See also


References

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