How These 13 European Countries Got Their Names

📺 WATCH NEXT:

⬇️ GET MY FREE STORYLEARNING® KIT

📖 LEARN A LANGUAGE THROUGH THE POWER OF STORY

✍🏼 BLOG VERSION:

Prefer reading? Check out a blog post version of this video here:

📷 FOLLOW ME ON INSTAGRAM

⏱ TIMESTAMPS:

0:00 - What’s in a Name?
0:14 - #1: Macedonia
1:02- #2: Spain
2:13 - #3: Malta
2:58 - #4: Liechtenstein
3:59 - #5: Norway
4:37 - #6: France
5:38 - #7: England
6:35 - #8: Ireland
8:12 - #9: Germany
9:17 - #10: Finland
10:12 - #11: Italy
11:32 - #12: Cyprus
12:36 - #13: Kosovo

📜 SOURCES & ATTRIBUTIONS:

[corinna]

Here in Canada we're taught that the name comes from a First Nations word "Kanata", meaning "Village".

[Zzoooooop]

For Indonesia.
it is thought to derive from the Greek indos, meaning “India, ” and nesos, meaning “island.” 

The name Indonesia derives from Greek words of Indos (Ἰνδός) and nesos (νῆσος), meaning "Indian islands".

[edwin]

Poles call Germans "babblers" or "people who can't speak". Their word for Italians either means "hairy" or "foreigners", but there's disagreement.

[a.r.]

In Finnish the Germany is called Saksa probably from the Saxons.

[volimneretvu]

Please make a part 2 with more European countries!

[spirosun]

No such thing as ancient Macedonian Slavs, they were Greek, Slavs arrived a thousand years after Alexander the Great

[guilhermewessler]

Brazil got its name from the brazilwood, a valuable tree that was largely extracted during the colonial period. That is why Brazilians are called "brasileiros" in Portuguese, with the suffix "-eiro" that usually stands for professions, as in "carpenter" = "carpinteiro", rather than something like "brasilianos". The original brasileiros were the people who dealt with brazilwood, and that came to represent all the people of Brazil.

The tree itself is bright red inside and that is why it got its name, which came from "brasa", "ember", as in "red like ember".

Some also say that there is a connection to the name "Brazil" and the island of Hy-Brasil, a mythical location somewhere west of the coast of Ireland, in the Atlantic. Supposedly the explorers from Europe would have known of the island and give its name to the lands of what now is Brazil, but that is just speculation.

[soundscape]

A very interesting video Olly, thanks! One about the capitals of the countries would be super as well.

[ryouxgaming]

Just got one of your books nice read thx keep it up

[comicserif]

12:48 As a linguist, you may appreciate knowing that your Arabic characters got scrambled at this point. This is a common problem with copying and pasting Arabic without Arabic language software installed.

[Anisia]

I just found out last week that "According to a widespread popular belief, the word Lietuva (Lithuania) originated from the Lithuanian words lyti (to rain) and lietus (rain)." - Wikipedia. Because it's actually raining too much here in autumn, winter and most of the spring!

[billthesecond]

According to Oxford University Professor Robin Lane Fox, Yale university professor Donald Kagan and professor/member of Institut de France Miltiades Hatzopoulos, Ancient Macedonia was a Greek Kingdom of Greek civilians. The Kingdom of Macedon was near the Illyria and Thrace, homes to the Illyrians and Thracians alike.
You mentioned the Slavs, but the settling of the Slavs on Balkan Peninsula began in the 6th century A.C.
As you mentioned the name itself comes from Greek, not from Slavic. It is a namme related to the Dorians as attributed by Herodotus.

According to wikipedia, Macedonians were an ancient tribe that lived on the alluvial plain around the rivers Haliacmon and lower Axios in the northeastern part of mainland Greece. Essentially an ancient Greek people, [1] they gradually expanded from their homeland along the Haliacmon valley on the northern edge of the Greek world, absorbing or driving out neighbouring non-Greek tribes, primarily Thracian and Illyrian.

In fact the name of this country has caused so much dispute between Bulgaria, North Macedonia, Greece and even Albania. The reason isn't the name itself but the politics that come with it. It was "settled" as North Macedonia because Greece already has a huge province named Macedonia and according to the Prespa Agreement:

When reference is made to the First Party these terms denote not only the area and people of the northern region of the First Party, but also their attributres, as well as the Hellenic civilisation, history, culture, and heritage of the region from antiquity to present day. When reference is made to the Republic of North Macedonia, these terms denote its territory, language and people, with their own, distinctly different, history and culture

In a poll of North Macedonia only 50% of the population voted and in Greece there was no poll with around 70% of Greeks being against the agreement. Bulgaria has also been very vocal about it, vetoing the whole situation. So not only is this a touchy subject, but it was a mistake to call the Macedonians of Ancient Times Slavs.

[stevencarr]

The Germans 'All men' was because the tribes had to unite because there was a rather big and threatening Roman Empire on their doorstep.
The Romans never conquered Germany, but perhaps they could have picked off the Angles and the Jutes and the Saxons if those tribes had not joined together.

[DaimyoD]

0:17 Wait, the Macedonian Empire only existed for 11 years??

[damjanfilipovski]

We Macedonians aren’t that tall compared to our neighbors funny enough. But they’re some of the tallest countries in the world like montenegro

[Zzoooooop]

Hmmm🙃
I would love to know about
Understanding languages
Through music perspective.
There are articles on that.

And since you are one of the few who's expert on both.

Also love videos on obscure languages
Like Tibetan and yddish.
Not much thourghly videos on those obscure languages.

[yiannisroubos]

Modern Macedonia is nothing to do with Ancient Macedonia. Ancient Macedonia was a Greek kingdom and Modern Macedonia is a Slavic republic.

[bogdi_]

The derivation of Moldova comes from a national legend saying the hunting dog called Moldova killed a aurochos on a rivers coast. I think it goes way deeper than that

[edwin]

In classic boring British, my country's name is "South" - Australis.

[IrKeNoVa]

México means "The center of the moon".