Saturday 13 March 2021

It would be much tidier if all our names for Eastern European countries ended with "...ia"

If and when Kosovia ever comes into existence, that will slot in nicely.
Click to enlarge: Outline map from here.

9 comments:

Sackerson said...

Like Anglia, Hibernia, Scotia and Cambria?

Mark Wadsworth said...

S, yes, that's the spirit.

Bayard said...

Why stop there? there's Frankia, Germania, Spania, Italia, Helvetia, Hellenia, Turkia....

A K Haart said...

It would certainly be tidia but would we be happia?

Woodsy42 said...

Where is Utopia?

KJP said...

Elbonia?

Mark Wadsworth said...

B, this rule should apply to E Europe because nearly all of them already end with "ia" or "a". West Europe and Scandinavia country names are a right old jumble and that's fine, and we have become familiar with these names over centuries.

AKH, I would be happia.

W, it means "nowhere". Dystopia is also not on there either (but would be funny, in the context).

K, I didn't include it for the same reason that I didn't Ruritania or Maldovia or any other made up country. most of these don't have defined borders (except the ones in the Netflix Xmas universe).

Bayard said...

Mark, a lot of western European countries already have a version ending in "ia", eg Helvetia for Switzerland. OK, I made up Spania, it should have been Iberia, but the others exist already. I think there's even one for Portugal, but I can't think of it.

Mark Wadsworth said...

B, you are missing the point.

Most of those E European countries only came into existence fairly recently and/or came into our conscience only recently. It's not too late to tidy up the names a bit, like changing "Hungary" to "Hungaria" or "Moldova" back to "Moldovia".

The names we use for W European countries are well established, it would be idiotic and confusing to try and change them.