Actually, the original name was…Amman. More or less - Rabat Ammon, after the Ammonites. It was changed to Philadelphia by the Lagid Greeks, then changed back by the Ghassanid Arabs ( it’s pretty likely the old name had lingered among the non-Greek speaking people of the region anyway ).
There were several other Philadelphias around beyond that. The one in western Anatolia had its name changed slightly later ( by the Greek Attalid dynasty of Pergamum ), but lasted longer, until the early Ottoman period.
I think that’s a little bit different because it’s not two different regions with the same name, it’s all really one region that has two modern countries on top of it. Actually, three, because the southwestern part of Bulgaria is also part of Macedonia. (Bulgarians don’t care about this specifically, because it’s just a minor part of their belief that Macedonia is actually part of Bulgaria, Macedonian is actually Bulgarian, and Macedonians are Bulgarians in denial. Ah, the Balkans.) The Greek argument is that Macedonia is “inherently” Greek in culture and therefore it’s wrong for a bunch of Slavs to usurp the name. Obviously this is a pretty complex issue or it would have been resolved a long time ago. The same thing would happen if some breakaway region in southeastern Bulgaria, northwestern Turkey, or northeastern Greece decided to call itself “Thrace” - all three countries would pitch a fit because they each claim to be the inheritors of ancient Thrace.
Yeah, but the district is always the Richmond. It’s never occurred to me that someone could get them mixed up.
Still, there are innumerable examples here in California of cities having the same names as cities in Spain or Latin America. Monterey v. Monterrey, for example.
I know the OP said no cities, but every other reply has a city in it. Besides, the matching side to my city references should trump mere provinces, nations, or even continents…!
[li]Albania 1. The English and other western name for Shqiperia, on the Adriatic Balkan coast between Montenegro and the Epirus region of Greece. 2. The Latin form for “Albany”, an old name for the Scottish kingdom (not Scotland as we know it today, but the area centered on the Lowlands.[/li][/QUOTE]
Really? You picked Albania as “Lowland Scotland” over ancient Albania in the Caucusus? I didn’t even know that the name was used for islands in the Atlantic…
