# What place naming conventions are used by non-English speaking countries? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 25, 2017, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858 "2017-10-25T23:57:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![zuer-coli](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/ba9def/32.png) [@zuer-coli](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zuer-coli)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2017, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/21 "2017-10-26T22:10:18Z")
Thank you all, such a wonderful variety of answers. Some of these I had read or heard about, a great many were new to me. I am not at all qualified to comment on any of them but I consider my ignorance to have been fought. Side remark: Dick Cheney was not wrong when he said [Paraphrase] We don’t know what we don’t know. I have some vague ideas of what I don’t know. I also believe there is just a great deal of things that could be known that I don’t even have a inkling about. Sometimes, I think that as my horizon of knowledge increases, it just expands the amount of things that could be known by me but aren’t. Again, Thanks to all who have replied. Zuer-coli ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2017, 10:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/22 "2017-10-26T22:40:33Z")
One I wonder about: If a Chinese newspaper had some reason to report on something in Cleveland, or Chicago, they’d obviously have to use some set of characters that phonetically approximates those names, because obviously Cleveland and Chicago don’t have native Chinese names. But what if something noteworthy happened in a city named after a Chinese city (say, Canton, OH)? Would they also phonetically approximate that, or would they use the same character as for Canton, China? And what if it’s, say, New York? They won’t have their own word for “York”, but there _is_ a Chinese word for “New”. Would they use that Chinese word, or would they find some character with a sound like “Noo”? Or, getting back to those towns for which there’s no option but the phonetic one: The Chinese languages have a lot of homophones. Is there some standardized choice of name that all Chinese style guides would use for foreign cities? How obscure does a city have to be before it’s not in such style guides? ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2017, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/23 "2017-10-26T22:41:56Z")
> [@zuer-coli](#): > > Side remark: Dick Cheney was not wrong when he said [Paraphrase] We don’t know what we don’t know. I have some vague ideas of what I don’t know. I also believe there is just a great deal of things that could be known that I don’t even have a inkling about. I think you mean [this](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/There_are_known_knowns). ---
**Author:** ![zimaane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a3d4f5/32.png) [@zimaane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zimaane)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2017, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/24 "2017-10-26T22:50:20Z")
In German the names for many Central and European cities are completely different from the name in the national language, a legacy of the long and extensive German cultural presence in these regions. Some examples are Pressburg (Bratislava), Revel (Tallinn), Lemberg (Lviv). My limited understanding is that these names are being slowly replaced with more “accurate” names. ---
**Author:** ![OldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3bc359/32.png) [@OldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 26, 2017, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/25 "2017-10-26T23:50:08Z")
> [@Alessan](#): > > In Hebrew, there are basically three groups: > > 1. 2,000-year-old Hebrew names: … “Sin” for China. Was there really knowledge of China in Israel/Judah 2000 years ago? ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/26 "2017-10-27T01:06:38Z")
> [@zimaane](#): > > In German the names for many Central and European cities are completely different from the name in the national language, a legacy of the long and extensive German cultural presence in these regions. Some examples are Pressburg (Bratislava), Revel (Tallinn), Lemberg (Lviv). My limited understanding is that these names are being slowly replaced with more “accurate” names. _Bratislava_ and _Pressburg_ are both derived ultimately from Braslav, the supposed founder of the settlement. In a sense, therefore, they are not different names for the same city, but the same name in different langauges, much like Gaelic _Dùn Èideann_ and Scots _Edinburgh_. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/27 "2017-10-27T02:03:59Z")
> [@UDS](#): > > _Bratislava_ and _Pressburg_ are both derived ultimately from Braslav, the supposed founder of the settlement. In a sense, therefore, they are not different names for the same city, but the same name in different langauges, much like Gaelic _Dùn Èideann_ and Scots _Edinburgh_. OK, well, then there’s Pozsony for Bratislava in Hungarian. But there are a bunch of Hungarian names for various parts of the former Austro-Hungarian empire. ---
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 2:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/28 "2017-10-27T02:19:53Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > 1. One I wonder about: …But what if something noteworthy happened in a city named after a Chinese city (say, Canton, OH)? Would they also phonetically approximate that, or would they use the same character as for Canton, China? > > 2. And what if it’s, say, New York? They won’t have their own word for “York”, but there _is_ a Chinese word for “New”. Would they use that Chinese word, or would they find some character with a sound like “Noo”? > > 3. Or, getting back to those towns for which there’s no option but the phonetic one: The Chinese languages have a lot of homophones. Is there some standardized choice of name that all Chinese style guides would use for foreign cities? How obscure does a city have to be before it’s not in such style guides? 1. It’s phonetic, 坎頓, as opposed to the Chinese city 廣州, but that’s predictable because ‘Canton’ for the Chinese city is from a Portuguese version of a dialectical pronunciation v. Guangzhou which mimics the Mandarin pronunciation. 2. Also phonetic. 3. I don’t know how small, but yes standard for cities of any size. As mentioned in previous discussions on this general topic, Chinese also also has its own pronunciations for proper names in nearby countries long in the ‘Sinosphere’ which don’t match the local pronunciations in those countries. Korean cities for example. Almost all Korean place names (people’s names also) are Chinese derived, can be written in Chinese characters with a particular meaning. But the characters typically have a different pronunciation in Korean than in Chinese. The Chinese typically write the characters used in Korean, not characters chosen to match the Korean pronunciation. The major exception is Seoul, virtually the only Korean place name without a Chinese character equivalent. Up to recently the Chinese translated ‘Seoul’ as 漢城, Hànchéng, pronounced Hanseong in Korean, a different name for the city from the Joseon era (‘Seoul’ was adopted after the end of Japanese rule in 1945). The modern Chinese style guide says to use the characters 首爾 which sound like Shǒu’ěr, in response to Korean annoyance, but Google Translate still comes back with Hànchéng for Seoul. Also on Chinese language internet pages it’s not unusual to see the Korean pronunciation of a Korean proper name parenthetically written in the Korean alphabet, under the assumption educated Chinese people interested in Korea might know it. In the other direction it used to be common for Korean media to write just the Chinese characters of Chinese place and people’s names, the reader would apply the Korean pronunciation. Now it’s standard to write the names in the Korean alphabet trying to match the Chinese pronunciation, sometimes with the Chinese characters in parentheses. A broadly similar issue exists between/among Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Vietnamese. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/29 "2017-10-27T04:10:30Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Hindustan is a Persian loanword, not an English-origin name. Well, the thread topic is about “non-English speaking countries,” isn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 4:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/30 "2017-10-27T04:18:23Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > This is very interesting. I’ve always wondered why that was since, as you note at the end, initial-Rs are common in modern Hungarian. Cool. > > Germany is an interesting one, as it seems to have quite the varied set of names for itself, depending on the language. Other than the German names, the French names, and the Latin names mentioned, there’s also the Slavic names, which are variants of proto-Slavic _nemcy_ (or similar), meaning something like “mute” or “foreigner” or “one who doesn’t speak our language.” Then there’s the variants naming it after the Saxon tribe, like Finnish _saksamaa_. And then the Baltic languages have their own series of exonyms that generally follow the pattern of an initial “v” with a /k/ or /ts/ as the next consonant over. There doesn’t seem to be an established etymology for that one, though. I was hoping you’d join in, _barátom!_ Just to add to the weirdness around Germany exonyms, while Italian names the country Germania, after Latin, similar to English, the Italian for German is _tedesco_. That is of course the Italianized version of ancient Germanic _þiudiskaz_, Old English _þēodisc_, Modern High German _deutsch_, and “Dutch.” ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/31 "2017-10-27T04:31:24Z")
What, no mention of a place name like “Chicago” which is (believe to be) a version of the native name that was first rendered in something like French (hence the initial “ch” being pronounced as in French rather than in English) which then was brought into English. The US landscape is littered with place-names that started in various Native languages filtered through various European languages (chiefly French and Spanish, but some others as well) then wandering into English. Because there are large areas of the US that were not originally English speaking either when owed by the Natives (of course) or seized by the colonials. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/32 "2017-10-27T14:54:37Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > For example, I was in Middle Tennessee a couple of weeks ago and it struck me how many places were called “Whomeverville”: you don’t find that structure in Spanish (we have places called “_Villa_something” or “_Ciudad_ Something” after a concept, not a person), but you also don’t see it in England. Ciudad Juarez and Ciudad Obregon, and that’s just from one country. ---
**Author:** ![Hector\_St\_Clare](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5ac83/32.png) [@Hector\_St\_Clare](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hector_St_Clare)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/33 "2017-10-27T14:55:43Z")
> [@UDS](#): > > _Bratislava_ and _Pressburg_ are both derived ultimately from Braslav, the supposed founder of the settlement. In a sense, therefore, they are not different names for the same city, but the same name in different langauges, much like Gaelic _Dùn Èideann_ and Scots _Edinburgh_. I’m pretty sure “Lemberg” and “Lviv” are cognates too, from a root for “lion”. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/34 "2017-10-27T17:31:26Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > For example, I was in Middle Tennessee a couple of weeks ago and it struck me how many places were called “Whomeverville”: you don’t find that structure in Spanish (we have places called “_Villa_something” or “_Ciudad_ Something” after a concept, not a person), but you also don’t see it in England. North America was settled recently enough that the names of the towns have not been eroded by centuries of use as they have been in Europe, so there are relatively few mysteries about how they actually got their names. And the majority of American towns and villages are named after people (the -ville, by the way, was borrowed from the French word for “city”). I suspect if we could find the actual origin of European names (what origins we have for most European place names are basically educated guesses), they would also mostly be named after people. > [@astorian](#): > > Des Moines, Iowa and Munich Germany both have names meaning “town of the monks.” Recently, I realized the Montreal, Konigsburg and Monterey all translate to “king’s mountain”. But the real winner in that contest would be various "New Town"s. Newton, Villanova, and Neustadt would be just the beginning. I doubt if there’s a significantly-sized linguistic community that doesn’t have a town named that in their own language. Nava, in a different thread, you mentioned something about having a list of all the American places named for Spanish provincial capitals. Were you aware of [Vittoria, Ontario](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Communities_in_Norfolk_County,_Ontario#Vittoria), which is named for Vitoria-Gasteiz? OK, an indirect naming, since it was actually named for a battle in the Peninsular Campaign, but the battle was named for the city it was near. ---
**Author:** ![zimaane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a3d4f5/32.png) [@zimaane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zimaane)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/35 "2017-10-27T18:19:35Z")
> [@](#): > > Was there really knowledge of China in Israel/Judah 2000 years ago? Well, Judah was part of the Roman empire, and the Romans were certainly aware of China, as the source of silk, if nothing else. ---
**Author:** ![zimaane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a3d4f5/32.png) [@zimaane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zimaane)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/36 "2017-10-27T18:21:32Z")
> [@](#): > > But the real winner in that contest would be various "New Town"s. Newton, Villanova, and Neustadt would be just the beginning. I doubt if there’s a significantly-sized linguistic community that doesn’t have a town named that in their own language. A famous one is Napoli (Naples) in Italy, which started life as a Greek settlement called Neopolis. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/37 "2017-10-27T19:21:33Z")
> [@zimaane](#): > > Well, Judah was part of the Roman empire, and the Romans were certainly aware of China, as the source of silk, if nothing else. Yes, but keep in mind that the name “סין” is quite classical Hebrew and has nothing to do with Rome. The Romans called the people Seres. ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 7:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/38 "2017-10-27T19:21:42Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > But what if something noteworthy happened in a city named after a Chinese city (say, Canton, OH)? Would they also phonetically approximate that, or would they use the same character as for Canton, China? Similarly, in Japan a foreign name that is derived from Japanese is still treated as a foreign name. They refer to Little Tokyo (Japanese neighborhood in LA) as リトルトーキョー (phonetic representation of “little tokyo”) not 小東京 (Japanese word for small and Tokyo). And when Kazuo Ishiguro won the Nobel Prize this year, Japanese newspapers reported his name as カズオ・イシグロ (phonetic, with first name first) even though he was actually born in Japan and had a Japanese name: 石黒 一雄. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/39 "2017-10-27T22:12:45Z")
> [@DPRK](#): > > Yes, but keep in mind that the name “סין” is quite classical Hebrew and has nothing to do with Rome. The Romans called the people Seres. [From Wikipedia:](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_China#Sinae.2C_Sin) > [@](#): > > Sīnae was an ancient Greek and Roman name for some people who dwelt south of the Seres (Serica) in the eastern extremity of the inhabitable world. References to the Sinae include mention of a city that the Romans called Sēra Mētropolis, which may be modern Chang’an. The name The Latin prefixes Sino- and Sin-, which are traditionally used to refer to China and the Chinese, came from Sīnae. ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [October 27, 2017, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858/40 "2017-10-27T22:39:15Z")
OK, but is Greek Sin related to Hebrew Sin as in Isaiah and Genesis? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-place-naming-conventions-are-used-by-non-english-speaking-countries/799858.md?page=3)