How Did The Capitals Of Europe Get Their Names?

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SOURCES AND FURTHER READING
List Of European Countries By Area: en.wikipedia.o...
Tirana: www.worldmayor....
Andorra: www.worldatlas...
Yerevan: traveltoarmenia...
Vienna: www.etymonline...
Baku: www.window2baku...
Minsk: minsksssf.blogs...
Brussels: www.etymonline...
Sarajevo: www.sarajevoti...
Sofia: www.etymonline...
Zagreb: www.croatiawee...
Nicosia: kypros.org/Cypr...
Prague: www.etymonline...
Copenhagen: www.etymonline...
Tallinn: www.etymonline...
Helsinki: www.newworlden...
Paris: www.etymonline...
Tbilisi: geohistory.tod...
Berlin: www.etymonline...
Athens: www.etymonline...
Budapest: www.etymonline...
Reykjavik: www.etymonline...
Dublin: www.etymonline...
Rome: www.etymonline...
Nur-Sultan: www.bbc.co.uk/...
Pristina: en.wikipedia.o...
Riga: en.wikipedia.o...
Vaduz: en.wikipedia.o...
Vilnius: regionai.stat.g...
Luxembourg City: www.etymonline...
Valletta: mymalta.guide/o...
Chișinău: en.wikipedia.o...
Monaco City: www.worldatlas...
Podgorica: en.wikipedia.o...
Amsterdam: www.etymonline...
Hague: www.etymonline...
Skopje: www.britannica...
Oslo: www.etymonline...
Warsaw: en.wikipedia.o...
Lisbon: www.lisbon-guid...
Bucharest: www.fareaway.co...
Moscow: www.etymonline...
San Marino: catholicexchan...
Belgrade: en.wikipedia.o...
Bratislava: www.etymonline...
Ljubljana: izi.travel/en/...
Madrid: theculturetrip...
Stockholm: www.etymonline...
Bern: www.etymonline...
Ankara: linguistics.st...
Kiev: www.etymonline...
London: • How Did The Boroughs O...
Vatican: www.etymonline...

[@sussekind9717]

Berlin wasn't just marshy a long time ago, it is still marshy today. Especially for a European city. A lot of areas have been drained to allow for construction, but there are many places, especially in the parks where you can walk along the ground and feel it's spongy nature from peat moss build-up over centuries. Flooding in the city, is not uncommon either.

[@Arlae_Nova]

"especially marshy for a European city". *Laughs in Dutch*

[@sussekind9717]

@@Arlae_Nova Salt marshes and reclaimed ocean. Not the same.

[@lurogtheblack]

Old Slavonic for Berlin iz Brljin, which means marshlands.

[@hedgehog3180]

It also explains something that puzzled me every time I visited the city, why you sometimes see pipes running above ground at street level and at the level of power lines. It's because in some parts of the city digging them down like is common elsewhere is either not possible or to difficult to do right now. It's also why much of Berlin's metro is actually at ground level and then everything above it is built one level higher.

[@noelleggett5368]

I thought Berlin was named after a jam donut! So many German towns seem to be named after food. 😜

[@clasqm]

European capitals: Mostly they mean "Yet another piece of useless swampland". Can't farm on that so we might as well build a city on it.

[@sirBrouwer]

Well that was the case for most cities in general. all bigger cities are not do to the swamp but do to the river feeding that swamp. Water has always been the major factor for a town to be build and grow bigger.

[@Vanalovan]

They said I was daft to build a city in a swamp but I built it all the same just to show them!

[@mikitz]

Say hi to New York for me.

[@eliasstenman3710]

I see why you did this specifically on this day.

[@cromania100]

Why?

[@michaelheeheejackson7255]

Vajled brexit

[@cromania100]

@@michaelheeheejackson7255 Oh I thought that was tomorrow

[@Johnstone_Studios]

Is this going to be your only video with a sponsorship?

[@eliasstenman3710]

Jude Johnstone He has already made sponsored videos before.

[@jobda1211]

Fun fact: In Poland exists legend explaining name of Warsaw (pl. Warszawa) it says that fisherman Wars fell in love in syren Sawa. That was a fact, now comes the fun part: Both Wars and Sawa are male names. It is common misconception because all female names end with -a, but some of uncommon male names also end with -a.

[@joechill9747]

Ha sound gay

[@mrcocoloco7200]

Gay!

[@hugo57k91]

Sava is a female name here

[@jobda1211]

@@hugo57k91 where? In Poland is definitely male (except of course the legend of Wars and Sawa😉)

[@hugo57k91]

@@jobda1211 Bosnia and Herzegovina.

[@rad2310]

"Over in North Macedonia we have the nation of Skopje". Certified bruh moment.

[@Arseni23]

He also had Baku wrong. It's on the coast.

[@davidmihailovski5264]

Kopje (in Skopje) in Maceodnian means spear 😊

[@rad2310]

@@davidmihailovski5264 Yeah I know, the had a bit about it on Zlatna Bubamara though I can't remember what year it was. It was legendary though.

[@jasoni4090]

Did he skip Montenegro?

[@rad2310]

@@jasoni4090 possibly

[@matej_grega]

"c" in Slavic names is pronounced like "ts"

[@yh7247]

Eric Hawes and in West Flemish as a h

[@daniellanctot6548]

I played the "shots" game every time the origins of a capital name was unknown or unsure: I did not make it to the end of the video.

[@lambda6564]

Also many slavic cities have different names in German. They were ruled for a long time by Prussia/Germany and Austria. Bratislava for example was called Preßburg and Königsberg became Kaliningrad. Maybe you could do a video about these German/Slavic mixture names. Their names could have interesting stories behind them. Greetings from Germany :)

[@radio8029]

I´m interested in that too. There are so many cities wich names got changed.

[@if6814]

Mangobonbon For example Berlin is a typical Slavic name

[@ramunc2261]

well that is true for many more languages,for example,the germans call Transylvania Siebenburgen and the Hungarians call it Erdely.

[@caferustwat]

Zagreb-Agram, all of the Polish cities have a German name.

[@ramunc2261]

@@caferustwat of course,since most of them have been under their ocupation for many,many years

[@NameExplain]

How many of these cities have you been to? I think I've only been to 9. London, Dublin, Paris, Reykjavik, Berlin, Stockholm, Riga, Rome, and Amsterdam.

[@TheLoughDuck55]

Dublin, Paris, Warsaw and Cork (only Irish people will get the last one) mup the people’s republic of Cork

[@Gulitize]

@Name Explain I couldn't find the name origin for Bern you claimed to be the same for Berlin. Berlin comes from the slavic berlo (swamp and so on) and Bern comes from the celtic berna (ravine, slit) none of them have germanic roots like you claimed. It would also be really strange for a city in the alps to have a slavic derived name.

[@_Mr.Tuvok_]

I heard, compared to us Yanks, Europeans leave their home country-vacation, business trips, etc.-much more often. True?

[@Strav9]

Lisbon Madrid Paris London Helsinki Stockholm Tallin Sarajevo Beograd

[@astridw4737]

I have only been to London and Rome on class trips, not even Berlin, even though I spent my entire life living in Germany

[@Dragoneye2828]

Polish capital Warsaw, Warszawa in Polish, has a legend behind it. According to the legend the city was founded by 2 brothers Wars and Sawa and the city was named by joining their names together. Yes I know, not the most exciting legend but still an explenation!

[@Dian_Borisov_SW]

It's a great legend. It's like the slavic version of Romulus and Remus but with more brotherhood.

[@karoljarocki4581]

I was tought the reason why it is called Warszawa is because of Mermaid Szawa and a guy called War, which they maried and forming city of Warszawa

[@lourencoalmada1305]

So Rome but with less fratricide

[@Ussurin]

Yeah, the mermaid version was also the one I was taught in school. War found a mermaid Szawa on an isle on Vistula, fell in love and married her, then they build their house in the spot. Over time a village was created around this house and later city.

[@DogDogGodFog]

I was taught the mermaid version but with the guy being named Wars, not War

[@_M_o_n_k_e]

"A proud European citizen" *Hmmmmmmmm* You have 2 hours left *cough*

[@gretep]

Europe doesn’t equal the EU though. Norway isn’t in the EU, it’s still an European country

[@tacosmexicanstyle7846]

Grete Pihlak The EU calls its people ‘European citizens’. Europe outside the union is not a political entity; it doesn’t have citizens.

[@tacosmexicanstyle7846]

Brax09 I didn’t come here to argue about what the EU is intending to do. Your fear mongering uninformed opinion is of absolutely no interest whatsoever to me.

[@LovelyAngel.]

Brax09 What are you if not a European country? What continent do you belong to? What makes you not European? I think most of people in the world associate a lot of British stuff even as "the only thing they know about Europe", like the monarchy, the architecture, the etiquette, traditions, etc.

[@elimalinsky7069]

@Brax09 By your logic Japan isn't in Asia, and the Japanese are not Asians. The UK and Ireland are definitely European countries by every single criteria (apart from not actually being on the continent, but then again, Europe isn't really a continent in the geographic sense).

[@joellund761]

Another name for Helsinki is Helsingfors. "Helsing" means someone from Hälsingland and "fors" means river in Swedish :)

[@harripursiainen5420]

Actually it means rapid in Swedish, not river.

[@TheLatokuivaaja]

And the rapids being referred to are located in the Vantaa river where it meets the Vanhankaupunginlahti (lit. Old City Bay) where Helsinki was originally founded in 1550.

[@monkofmayhem1373]

Is Helsingfors the official name for Helsinki? I was there last year for a few weeks and seem to remember it on a lot of signs.

[@hysterikole1]

@@monkofmayhem1373 Its the Swedish name for Helsinki (they use both Swedish and Finnish there)

[@walker_andrej]

I went to Belgrade the other day, apparently, back in the days, there was a massive castle near River Danube. The castle walls were white, so when the sun was shining it was a bit blinding for people going to the city.

[@mihailodiklic]

I think you are talking about Kalemegdan 🇷🇸

[@Ognjen20.]

I'm from Belgrade and every time I go to that kalemegdan castle I get lost hahahah

[@noelvyhnanek5951]

Bratislava sounds a lot like "brothers' glory" or something with honoring brother(s) in Slovak. If it's really the name of a leader, his name would most likely just be Bratislav.

[@rafalch5530]

I'm Polish and to me it sounds like something along the lines of "Slavic Brothers" Brati-Slava

[@noelvyhnanek5951]

That's definitely an option. How did I never notice that?

[@MartinMizner]

To be corect: It should be named Bratislav's town, but Bratislava is shortened and sounds better.

[@nadieloves6627]

When I visited Bratislava, I believe the tour guide said it was named after the brothers Saints Cyril and Methodius, known as the "Apostles to the Slavs".

[@noelvyhnanek5951]

Boy I'm out here learning more about my city's name in the comments of a youtube video than years and years of living here :D

[@rezance9843]

Belgrade is called Beograd in serbian and literally means Whitecity

[@MartinMizner]

-Grad, -Hrad it sometimes means fortress, sometimes city. Well most of the cities were found near well fortified places and that explains it.

[@SidBlackheart]

@@MartinMizner In Serbo-Croatian, 'grad' can only mean 'city' or 'town'.

[@mambojambo4870]

I hate to be that guy, but German "Bär" is pronounced nearly exactly like English "Bear". Love your videos, keep up the good work :)

[@BurnBird1]

pfft, you think those dots mean anything? All those foreign dots and lines are just European nonsense, done to make it look foreign. /s

[@happytofu5]

for maximum confusion: you can write the letter ä also as ae, if you don't have the key on your keyboard. which means that you can write "bär" as "baer" in german ;-p

[@boriszakharin3189]

Fun fact: in Russian the word saraj means "shed" and the suffix "-evo" is often used for naming a village named after a person or an object of some sort. From that perspective it always sounded funny to have the capital of Bosnia/Herzegovina be a village named after a shed, especially since a number of villages with that name actually exist in Russia.

[@Tryphara]

btw fun fact: the German "bär" is pronounced almost the same as the English "bear" :) when I was in elementary school I always pronounced "bear" like "beer" but this lil fact helped me

[@alejandroojeda1572]

Why wouldn't cyprus be in Europe if you include Armenia...😓

[@hailgiratinathetruegod7564]

Because the defination of europe. Europe border is defined by the caucasus mountains (even though I would say Armenia, unlike Georgia and Azerbaijan, it doesnt qualified). When while is Cyprus 100% part of asia. It is not only closest to asia, but on the same contiental shelf. (Which is how it is defiened to which continent Islands belong)

[@sababugs1125]

@@hailgiratinathetruegod7564 if we go with the Caucasus detention Georgia and Azerbaijan still have some European territories

[@hailgiratinathetruegod7564]

@@sababugs1125 yes, I only said Armenia does't fit in that defination

[@sohaibnassar7059]

Its also part of the eu

[@seneca983]

Armenia at the very least borders Europe, unlike Cyprus.

[@neville1311]

Kazakhstan's capital was named Astana before they changed to Nur-Sultan Astana is kazakh for Capital City

[@shibolinemress8913]

You should probably mention where the English names for capital cities differ from their names in the language of their countries. Vienna, for example, is actually Wien in German. A video on how English got it's names for foreign cities would be interesting!

[@1258-Eckhart]

Vienna reached the English language via Romance-speaking merchants who had inculturated the word from the Germanic "Wenia" into "Vienna", so a vowel-shift forwards. So it's actually the same word.

[@hiccuphufflepuff176]

I wonder if there's a parallel universe in which the capital of Italy is "Reme."

[@standooostandooo9195]

As far as I know Bratislava was called Prešporok before ww1 which derives from german Preßburg. After colapse of Austria-Hungary Slovaks just made new name for cit. Bratislava name is probably just a combination of 2 words Brat - brother Sláva/Slovan - Glory/Slavic

[@comradesam3382]

Could it also be brother and glory? I know that in my language slava is glory

[@standooostandooo9195]

Yeah, it could be a “Brothers Glory” or “Slavic Glory”...

[@catboiprincess]

Bratislava is called ‘Pozsony’ in Hungarian, who ruled above the city for a long-long time.

[@standooostandooo9195]

Well, the name “Pozsony” as you suggest was just another name of city enforced by hungarian politics during national suppresion of nations libing in Hungary (hungarization/magyarizatio) The name itself was just a derification of Preßburg or in slovak Prešporok. I did a little research and found out that apart greek/latin name Istropolis the name of city come from slavic “Braslavъ” (written in 9. century reconstructed medieval slavic/slovak form) from which the name Bratislava may come from...

[@standooostandooo9195]

Polish Hero Witold Pilecki what are you talking about?

[@vbucci6894]

Serbian viewers seeing this: *angry typing*

[@strevortni]

yeah he didn't talk about the lore behind the name pretty offended lol

[@teratoph]

I'm gonna tell you a legend about Skopje! The city itself has seven exits, much like the seven orphaces of a human head. It's said that a legendary hero wielding a spear killed a giant monster and where its skull lay the hero laid down to die too. He became the mountain of Vodno right next to Skopje and the name comes from "with a spear" - so kopje

[@davidroman4780]

Bratislava is a new name. It was given to the city when Austro-Hungarian Empire fell apart in 1918 and Czechoslovakia was born with Slovaks regaining statehood after a millenia of being part of Hungary, at the time many cities, towns and villages changed names. Bratislav is an actual human name, though barely used. Brat- brother , Slava -glory/fame , this applies to both Bratislav and Bratislava. When it comes to original name of Bratislava it depends on who you ask. Germans called it Preßburg, Hungarians called it Pozsony and Slovaks called it Prešporok. If i remember correctly both Pozsony and Prešporok are names that originate from a person, that is still not confirmed if even existed. That being a Great Moravian prince who lived in 10th century. He was 3rd son of King Svätopluk and brother to Mojmír II. and Svätopluk II. . When Svätopluk I. died his sons split Great Moravia between each other with Predslav gaining land of Prešporok/Pozsony for himself with the city bearing his name. Again this is disputable , as we cannot know for sure if Predslav even existed. Unfortunarely i dont know where does Preßburg come from with my best guess being that its the name Germans gave it based on the names Prešporok and Pozsony.

[@MarioAtheonio]

All the names that the city has had over the years could be a video of itself.

[@kaloarepo288]

A lot of Hungarian royalty is buried in Bratislava =and weren't the Hungarian kings crowned here at one stage?

[@MarioAtheonio]

Kalo Arepo I know Maria Theresa and a bunch of other Habsburgs were crowned there.

[@kaloarepo288]

@@MarioAtheonio I'm talking about the medieval Hungarian kings and not the time when Hungary was incorporated into the Habsburg Empire.It was one of their capitals then.

[@davidroman4780]

Kingdom of Hungary was formed by Magyars who conquered Duchy of Nitra (see Hungarian Coat of Arms, stripes - magyars , double cross - nitra) and Prešporok/Pozsony was indeed a coronational city, but Pest was always the capital , and Ostrihom/Ezstergom was the seat of the Arcbishop

[@Can-vw1cb]

From what I know as an ankarian (I live in Ankara :D) I heard the name Ankara comes from the ancient place of Ankyria which was a farming state or kind of country. Ankara doesn’t have any access to sea so anchor isn’t really a good guess lol

[@Grunk111]

Isn't it in ancient Galatia as well, which was founded by migrating celts? Ankara/ankyra might be older than Galatia though.

[@emrecanarduc4378]

@@Grunk111 galats were the tribe's name. Ankara's name comes from Angora - - >Ancyra-->Ankara

[@emrecanarduc4378]

But also it may Come from Ankruwa which is mean Temple of Anka (in Hittite)(most possiable one because this name is written in ancient Hittite tablet) . By the way Angora comes from Sun Language Theorem and it says name is originally comes form Altay area (in middle Asia)

[@akinoz]

Emrecan Arduç Sun language theory isn’t a scientific term.

[@TheRealGuywithoutaMustache]

Very nice, I've always been curious as to how London and Berlin got its name

[@BinglesP]

Wow a comment from JSGwaM that doesn’t have thousands of likes

[@lurji]

get a life

[@Gulitize]

The map shown for Baku doesn't even include the location of the city.

[@NameExplain]

The maps and the locations of the cities within them are just for display purposes. Not very accurate at all I'm afraid.

[@Gulitize]

@@NameExplain I could also not find the name origin for Bern you claimed to be the same for Berlin. Berlin comes from the slavic berlo (swamp and so on) and Bern comes from the celtic berna (ravine, slit) none of them have germanic roots like you claimed. It would also be really strange for a city in the alps to have a slavic derived name.

[@Grunk111]

@@Gulitize Sneaky Mountain Slavs?

[@QemeH]

@@Gulitize There are about a million towns in the alps named after different words for ravine or crevice. I once lived in an area of austria where there were 4 towns called "Feistritz" within a one hour travel distance alone. This comes from the slavic "Bystrica", quite literally meaning "white water" (= rapids). In other countries this name got changed to Beszterce (Hungary), Wistritz (Silesia) or Bistritza (Czech Republic).

[@aniratac19]

@@NameExplain Also, why is the arrow pointing to Porto, in Portugal, and not to Lisbon? It´s slightly misleading... :-/

[@R3stor]

Bratislava was called this way after Czechoslovakia's foundation back in 1918. To that day it was called Poszony (in Hungarian) or Pressburg in German. It had many presses for wine, so maybe it was called after that. The name Bratislava was created because we wanted everything to be cut from the former monarchy and thus we created this slavic name. In fact back in 9 or 10 century one of the first settlements in this area was called Braslav after some slavic ruler Braslav. In Greek, it is also called Istropolis, like Istro = Danube and polis = city

[@henrikl.w.4058]

7:28 The old name of the Kazakh capital was Astana. In Kazakh "Astana" means "Capital".

[@pointlessviewer]

As a Turkish, "Ankara" also sounds like "Ana Kara" which means "Mainland" in Turkish.

[@galiciangladiator5857]

So much for Name Explain saying in the Americas video he had never once referred to himself as European.

[@winstonc.6951]

Fake European "nationalism" at it's worst. It's cringy and takes so much away from the amazing individual cultures of Europe.

[@LordDim1]

Winston C. But who wouldn’t feel nationalism and pride towards faceless bureaucrats in Brussels? They’re so inspiring!

[@Fauntleroy.]

Well-timed and well-played, sir. Kudos from America.

[@liamolaoghaire]

Cyprus is in both Europe and Asia but it is in the EU and Eurozone so I’d count it, as a country it feels more European then Asian personally

[@circeismyspirit]

The name Riga comes from a river that used to flow through old Riga called "rīdze".

[@OrtegaDani885]

You made a mistake: Vella is not town, it's Old, so it's not Andorra thw town, it's Andorra the old.

[@ivanmacias9603]

Actually, it does mean Andorra The Town. The problem is, in Catalan, the terms evolved over time so now people think it means Andorra The Old, but that "Vella" used to mean "Town" back in the days, like "Villa" today.

[@warrenlehmkuhleii8472]

I suspect a little treason.

[@Patryk128pl]

10:01 WHAT!? The name of "Warszawa" comes from the fisherman named "Wars" and mermaid named "Sawa" who fell in love and married living happily and long. Around their home small fishing village arose named "Warszawa" (Warsaw in English, because apparently Polish "sz" being identical to English "sh" was too hard to keep with English crazy spelling, or something.), which later grew "a little". Then was almost completely destroyed by Germans, but eventually rebuilt. Yeah, I know the history of Wars and Sawa is a legend, but the same is a history of Romulus and Remus!

[@Patryk128pl]

Also "war" in Polish is "wojna". I know in English you can split Warsaw into "war saw", but in Polish it would be "wojenna piła", or "wojna widziana", so it doesn't make any freaking sense.

[@chloroplast8611]

@@Patryk128pl YEAH!!! HE PRONOUNCED BUDAPEST WRONG TOO!!!! HUNGARIAN AND POLISH BROTHERS UNITE!!!!!

[@azuregriffin1116]

@@Patryk128pl I love Polish, as a language. And also, us Brits are given almost no worthwhile foreign language education, so we're not used to re-thinking how we should pronounce stuff. German, in my opinion, is fairly simple, yet most Brits would cringe away from trying to pronounce Mädchen because it looks weird, when it is simple 'maid' (in a Yorkshire accent), h as in 'human', and a simple 'un' sound as in "station" or "vacation." English phonetics are stupid.

[@mrpddnos]

The Capital of The Netherlands is Amsterdam. There isn’t a Dutchmen who will ever consider The Hague as the Capital. It is the seat of the government, true. But that’s it. Perhaps people outside the country mistake The Hague for the Capital but it’s not an official or unofficial stance. Though the have been people asking for a discussion to chance the Capital to The Hague. But even those people don’t consider The Hague our Capital.

[@olekx99]

About Kyiv, Ukraine: According to a legend, East Slavs founded Kyiv in the 5th century. The legend of Kyi, Shchek and Khoryv speaks of a founder-family consisting of a Slavic tribal leader Kyi, the eldest, his brothers Schek and Khoriv, and also their sister Lybid, who founded the city. Kyiv is translated as "belonging to Kyi" or as "Kyi's place".

[@ilvibos3512]

Hey, Name Explain I’ll help you with the East Slavic capital names. Belarus- Minsk; The common Slavic “isk” suffix is basically the same as English “ish” and designates affiliation. The affiliation is to the river it stands on, “Menya” which comes from the protobaltoslavic root for little. The English cognate would be “Mini”. It was named so because it’s a smaller tributary branch of the Ptich River. Russia- Moscow Basically carries the name of the river it stands on, the Moscow River. The word Moscow is most likely from protobaltoslavic origin as well, from “Muzg” meaning damp, wet, bogy place. The English cognate is probably “marsh” Ukraine- Kiev Either the legend is true and it literally named after a legendary tribal chieftain Kiy, making it literally “Kiys (town/settlement/place)” If true then in that sense Kiy is an ancient word for Staff/Rod. If legend is not true then it can come from the Ukrainian word “Kyiava” meaning steep hill. Hope than answered the unknowns

[@thelist3253]

So, to simplify Minsk means Little-ish Moscow means Marsh Kiev is literally Kie’s Kie means staff Right?

[@ilvibos3512]

The List, Yes exactly

[@justbeyondthecornerproduct3540]

I do wish he'd reach out to his subscribers more rather than trying to guess the pronunciations himself.

[@ilvibos3512]

Just Beyond The Corner Productions yeah! Usually I like his stuff but I felt this one was poorly researched. Belgrade means white fort/city not white ford. Bratislava is not named after a chief but it was renamed to Bratislava after Slovakia separated from Austria. It’s literally two words put together Brothers + Slav. And there’s more in Slavic Etymology I feel he got wrong

[@dushmanmardom]

I've read that Minsk could come from old slavic root, that nowadays transformed into menyat(sa) meaning to trade, as it was a place of trade, but dunno.

[@realhawaii5o]

9:45 "Over in Macedonia we have the nation of Skopje"?

[@Teoishere777]

Hawaii 5O !!! correction !!! “Over in south Serbia we have the nation of Skopje” 😁

[@sskspartan]

@@Teoishere777 Bulgaria *

[@davidmihailovski5264]

Theodore Papagiannidis Nemoj se blamirat, molim te 🙄!

[@davidmihailovski5264]

sskspartan Мoля, спрете наистина 🙄

[@davidmihailovski5264]

Btw, Kopje (in Skopje) in Macedonian means spear 😊

[@sarosilevente]

Bratislava was a big hungarian city 100years ago before slovakia existed it's original name was Pozsony

[@havedalDK]

It would be nice if you pronounced Copenhagen in either English or Danish. Not German please. I can hear you've tried to pronounce the capitals closest to their native language, but the way you pronounced Copenhagen was in German, like this: Kopenhagen, when in Danish it is this: København. København is not even close to Kopenhagen (in terms of pronunciation). I'm only writing this comment, because I know there is a chance you'll read it, and not do the same thing in the future. A friendly reminder from a Dane. We aren't Germans.

[@justbeyondthecornerproduct3540]

Hey, he's mispronounced Irish place names before. I know how you feel.

[@havedalDK]

@@justbeyondthecornerproduct3540 Yeah, but but at least he didn't pronounce it in another language that isn't English

[@lelandunruh7896]

I am from Round Rock. There is a large round rock in the creek in the middle of town. Round Rock is called the "Sports Capital of Texas". You can all sleep easy now with this important knowledge.

[@uatvprograms505]

Kyiv is short for "Kyiv hrad", meaning "Kyi's town", where Kyi is the legendary founder.

[@DogDogGodFog]

In Polish it's 'Kijów' and that means either 'The town of the long sticks' or 'The town that belongs to the Kijs' or 'The town that belongs to the long sticks' lol

[@zack4915]

Actually, Budapest isnt only made up of Buda and Pest, its also Óbuda, which is old Buda

[@SlobodanKunst]

10:45 Belgrade doesn't mean white fort, it means white city.

[@angeloreyes1951]

That is not correct, the original meaning of the old slavic word grad means fort/fortress, which makes sense because cities back then were essencially just forts with or without markets outside of it, I am also a serb so don't @ me saying I don't know shit. Later on it changed its meaning from fort to city. en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Slavic/gord%D1%8A

[@SlobodanKunst]

@@angeloreyes1951 *gȏrdъ m[1][2][3] fortification, castle town, city Your source says it also means town, city. I'm from Belgrade. All of my life I've only heard that it refers to the word City, not Fort. The name of the Belgrade fort is Kalemegdan.

[@seneca983]

@@SlobodanKunst: "All of my life I've only heard that it refers to the word City, not Fort." I guess it could be semantic drift meaning it may have been used to mean "fort" far in the past but now has the meaning "city".

[@angeloreyes1951]

@@seneca983 yep, that's what I said, old meaning: fort; new meaning:city Whether or not mr.Kunst only heard it as in the context of meaning "city" is irrelevant, since most people are not linguists, kalemegdan is the turkish name for the fort which is alsp irrelevant since the fort existed ( although rebuilt multiple times ) long before the turks even saw Belgrade. Belgrade bore this name long before mass migration, even before the city had 20.000 people, so the term grad most likely refered to a fort rather than a city.

[@Arseni23]

In Russian город means town, крепость means fort. In Czech hrad is fort and město means town.

[@karoljarocki4581]

Actually the reason why Polands Capital is called Warszawa(Warsaw) because of the legends were a guy called War, and he has fallen in love with a mermaid called Szawa and started making their or city called Warszawa

[@JPPJustPerfectPlayers]

As always awesome video! Love your content! Only one small, but important correction that I would like to suggest as a Ukrainian. You missplled Kyiv. A bit of insight, it is actually somewhat of a controversial topic since Kiev is the Russian version of our city's name, while Kyiv is in Ukrainian, but since we are not on really good terms with Russia nowadays, it's much more respected to write Kyiv and that 's the official name of our city since Ukrainian is the only official language in Ukraine. Besides that, you are indeed correct, I would say you could have been 100% certain about the origin of this name since your "probable version" is true, it indeed derives from the name of one of the founders of the city and his name was Kyi. (Кий) of course nobody knows for sure, but it's the most accepted version. Again, awesome video I understand that you are probably not aware of every tiny detail and controversy of each European state, so no worries.

[@JovanLemon]

The podgorica one actually mazed me, I actually can't believe that I didn't realise that until now.

[@maxpuente6291]

andorra la vella is pronounced as andorra la "veya" rather then "vela" and it acc means "andorra the old one"

[@PRDreams]

Does the rr makes a single r sound, a "Spanish" double r sound, or a different sound altogether? Always wanted to ask.

[@maxpuente6291]

@@PRDreams strong sound. in catalan when r goes alone it makes a subtle sound similar to english one even subtler but when r is at the beginning of the word or is doubled rr it makes strong "spanish" sound

[@PRDreams]

@@maxpuente6291 thanks!

[@hanytelfah7069]

Always creative with your video ideas. I got one. How about the city of Damascus. It is pretty old so it should prove challenging.

[@forregom]

4:02 why did you take away Bosnia's coast?

[@mrcocoloco7200]

Because ahhhhh :] I don't know.

[@Fauntleroy.]

Was Bosnia even using it, though?

[@hugo57k91]

@@Fauntleroy. it's the only coastal city and is huge for tourism. So yes

[@mrcocoloco7200]

@@Fauntleroy. Yeah I'm pretty sure they do. You know for the Beaches and Tourism.

[@Grunk111]

Your coastline is unfortunately within the margin of error.

[@yuf669]

I like how he used "Chișinău" in country native language (he pronounced it incorrectly) but for other cities he used their english names. I would like to know why.

[@RazvanMaioru]

I've only ever read/heard chișinău in Romanian (Moldovan if you feel like calling it that), so I don't think there even are translations of it. I think that might be why.

[@mikelitorous5570]

I don’t get why people say they are proud to be European or they say that they are European before being British for example. I’ve never understood that, the only thing that I would say is European about me is my race. But even then that means nothing.

[@xboxgamerhr]

Family nation race others That's obviously how it goes From most important to least

[@mihoraboteg9034]

I love your pronounciation of word zagrabi (Im Croat) and the legend goes a bit diffrently...One day a knight came back from war, he traveld a long way and was very thirsty.He asked a girlif she could give him some water so he can drikn it.She came down to very small lake and zagrabila water into the bucket..Her name was Marina or Martina and the fountain which is now standing on that same place has her name.Great video

[@brunog3768]

Hi Patrick!

[@bucketofcereal3711]

The Slovakian capital of Bratislava was named after a village which used to exist under the castle. The village was called Braslava, named after its ruler, which lived in the castle, Braslav

[@legerarts]

Rome is probably not named after Romulus, he's most likely named after the city to explain it's origin. The origins of the name are unclear, but may derive from the Greek (ῥώμη, meaning 'strength'), the Etruscan (𐌓𐌖𐌌𐌀, meaning 'teat') or the word Rumon/Ruman (which is an old name for the river Tiber).

[@JulianSki]

Might say this wrong but lets do this Legend goes that one day a fisherman named war was fishing in the Vistula river and while fishing he encountered a mermaid named szawa in which they fell in love with each other and decided to found a city? (don't really know in that part) named warszawa

[@grry02]

Great video as always! Love to see your notification across the screen. I am early, does Name Explain reply? :3

[@MalePietje]

In the Netherlands we don't view The Hague as one of two capitals of the country (it is the capital city of the province South-Holland though), but just as a city that happened to be the seat of government. Amsterdam is, by constitution, our one and only national capital. Article 32 of the Dutch constitution mentions that "the King shall be sworn in and inaugurated as soon as possible in the capital city, Amsterdam"

[@torbjornlekberg7756]

As for Stockholm, the stakes were put in the bay, used for defense against pirates and as a way to collect toll.

[@reptilezsweden]

Tripple meaning: Stock = Log (tree trunk) 1. Logriders used this area to transport timber "stockar" 2. Stakes made from "stock" was put in the waterbed in a defensiv measure 3. A lot of the islands were expanded by also putting "stockar" in the waterbed and filling in the areas in between (this being the modern official reason for the name Stockholm I believe)

[@brado1912]

Interesting enough. Dublin is named after the Irish Dubh Linn but Dublin in Irish is actually Baile Átha Cliath (something along the lines of shield town)

[@みゅんぞ]

Andorra la vella doesnt mean andorra the town, it means andorra the old

[@stoferb876]

The wooden stakes in stockholm were not used "throughout the city". They were a kind of underwater contraptions for naval defense of the city and used throughout the surrounding archipelago and it's many waterways.

[@tinyupes]

There are going to be hate comments saying the UK is not part of Europe

[@jaspervankruijssen4916]

But it is.. The EU and Europe are two different things.

[@tinyupes]

No because the UK is on an island

[@middler5]

What continent is it in then?

[@jaspervankruijssen4916]

@@tinyupes by that logic Ireland and Iceland aren't part of Europe either. Nor would Indonesia and japan be in Asia. And whole Oceania are basically just a bunch of islands

[@turkoositerapsidi]

@@jaspervankruijssen4916 +

[@HotelPapa100]

Bern being called after a marsh is rather improbable. The city sits on a high rocky promontory in a loop of the river Aare. Still might be called after the land below, of course.

[@luizfellipe3291]

3:28 "🎼In the way the wind blows doesn't really matter to me🎼" Bohimian Raphsody-Queen

[@sophievandermeij866]

Love the way you tried to pronounce S'gravenhage

[@KingsleyIII]

Skip to 2:03.

[@matthewmccallion3311]

Great video as usual, Patrick! Unfortunately, at 7:02 you've included the Inishowen peninsula in Northern Ireland. It's in County Donegal in the Republic of Ireland.

[@AudibleAnarchist1]

9:46 - I'm not sure is calling Skopje a nation is a mistake or just you acknowledging it for the city-state that it is.

[@AudibleAnarchist1]

10:54 - also 'Bratislava' basically means something the slavic version of 'the town of brotherly love'.

[@Arseni23]

@@AudibleAnarchist1 but slav could also be the origin. It just recently clicked for me "Slovan" Is from word slovo (word), I just never thought about it before. And other countries calling our slavs is probably our name often end in slav, It along with our languages is our most common trait. (Jaroslav, Miroslav, Stanislav, Desislav, Boleslav, ... Thats literally all I can think of in Czech? Wow

[@slavenarkaimovski3897]

Rome has get his name from slavic word Ruma,it stands for the place of residece,the 'english word' room comes from slavic word ruma,and slavic word for basement is Podrum,or room under the room.Ruma is also city in serbia.

[@emizerri]

Thanks for the video but 11:50 really bro? "Ancarla" Please stop trying to pronounce tapped r's

[@Stakker]

Pemze same with Tirana. Sure he said Tilana

[@reinismartinsons]

Riga comes from Rīdzene/Rīdziņa, a river that used to run through the old city.

[@Dragoninja26]

Replying to this mainly for a futile effort to get this up higher (reason I went to comments was to look for a comment like this, only found 2, disappointingly this one had no likes, the other was less accurate but had 2), but also to add that (from what I've learned about this) at the time people didn't know what the consequences would be, so the river was filled with trash and became smelly and disgusting, that's why it was gotten rid of, always thought it was really unfortunate this happened to the river

[@aG-td2uu]

Finally, someone actually including the Caucasus when talking about Europe

[@TheNIK10000]

About Skopje, in Greece we use the words σκοπός (skopós) which means Guard and σκοπιά (skopià) which means guard post.

[@nickpaschentis5284]

Please my friend find my comment and post that to help me.

[@MrFredrikWolf]

00:50 "The nation of europe"

[@davidmihailovski5264]

Fredrik Wolf And the "nation" of Skopje as well 😂

[@LEDiceGlacier]

Bratislava could also mean brati=brothers and slava=Slavic meaning Slavic Brothers. Just my personal theory

[@rigaskl8325]

Do How did the capitals of Asia got their names

[@ijmillares9005]

rigas KL can be by parts since asia is a huge continent

[@David-qq9bk]

Fairy of Oz asia has about the same number of countries as europe

[@ijmillares9005]

My bad, you're right crazy to think a small continent like Europe has roughly the same number of countries as asia

[@David-qq9bk]

Fairy of Oz yeah, cause european countries are REALLY small when compared to asian countries.

[@ByddinRhyddidCymru]

Think this is the first time anyone has called Blackpool interesting, also, Wales capital Cardiff, comes from the Welsh ‘caer’ meaning fort & ‘taf’ meaning river, as the city was founded when Cardiff Castle was built next to the river that runs through the area

[@lurogtheblack]

9:11 you pronounced it podgoriKa, actually it's, podgoriTZa, theres Ts like in pizza

[@vaclav_fejt]

Regarding Prague, or Praha - "praha" literally (archaically) means "dry places" (basically desert-like). "Pražit" doesn't feel right with me, it means "to roast (coffee)" - same root, as it's making something dry without fire, while the burning of the forest to make room is the historic "žďářit" - and there are several places named Žďár. Also one named Světlá ("A light one"), because there was a clearing, so scorching the wood was not necessary.

[@herbert4725]

You kind of blueballed macedonians and hungarians you just said buda+pest=budapest and about skopje you said it comes from skupi

[@deadlive3212]

He has a whole Video about Budapest.

[@herbert4725]

@@deadlive3212 yeah I just used that as an example he still dodnt explain skopje

[@davidmihailovski5264]

In Macedonian, Kopje (in Skopje) means spear. I think that's the name's origin. 😊

[@nickpaschentis5284]

It come from the Greek word for seeing guard,It happened that Greeks considered the Area just below the city as the Border between Greek lands and Paionia lands. So a fort was built there as a Guard.

[@kaloarepo288]

In the past I have tried to ascertain the etymology of the city of Rome -Roma.One theory and it sounds plausible is that it comes from STROMA -referring to the river(Tiber)on which it is built and from the root word rhe which means to flow and is related to such words as stream and strom and indeed to rheumatism,diarrhoea and to names of other European rivers like the Rhine,Rhone,the Reno(Bologna) and the Strymon in Greece.

[@lEGOBOT2565]

Proud European citizen until Midnight UTC+1, then you'll be a proud British citizen

[@turkoositerapsidi]

Britain still europe even if its not EU, doesnt matter EU isnot same as Europ.

[@letnjiznoj]

@@turkoositerapsidi woooosh

[@turkoositerapsidi]

@@letnjiznoj jooooogh

[@letnjiznoj]

@@turkoositerapsidi you fell for the joke and later are telling me I missed the joke ??????

[@turkoositerapsidi]

@@letnjiznoj You didnt get it?

[@jorgefortes6674]

Lisboa (Lisbon), according to some later studies, probably came from the accadian phoenician) "alis ubo" meaning "pleasant bay" as the large estuary of the river Tejo (Thagus) presents excelent conditions for harbouring,,

[@mkaali]

Why not put the origin words on the screen? It's pretty useless to just hear them in English and accented English even.

[@gretep]

Accented English? Every English is accented English, the American accent is not the default

[@thebrutusmars]

Grete Pihlak Well, he tries to pronounce some of these as close to the local accents that he can. I think that’s what Mkaali was getting at.

[@Ragemuffn]

Helsing isn't just associated with Hälsingland. It also refers to narrowing. Helsinki is near a narrowing of the sea. This happens in two sibling towns in South Sweden and Denmark. Helsingborg and Helsingør, they're unrelated to Hälsingland. So evidence suggests it's most likely named after where the sea narrows.

[@RedHair651]

You should spend more time learning how to pronounce those names if you literally are a channel about names 😅

[@anniesearle6181]

Tallinn is a very beautiful city that's very much worth a visit. Spent a week there last summer and it was really fun

[@komocity269]

European Capitals name etymology : Roman Greek German and slavic languages .. :D

[@RazvanMaioru]

And celtic too... so literally every category of language there is in europe: latin, germanic, celtic, slavic, and also greek which doesn't really fit in well, has been used to name something. Not really a surprise, is it?

[@al_fletcher]

Who else is vicariously travelling the world from their houses with this video?

[@esior8284]

Warsaw has this legend about Wars and Sawa from whose names the city's name was created. There are two versions of this legend, one where Wars and Sawa, a fisherman and his wife found, saved and allowed lost prince to sleep in their house. In the morning he said that land near their house should be called "Warszawa". Secon version (less believable tho) is about Wars, young fisherman who had caught mermaid called Sawa.

[@alejandroghysbrecht6428]

You should do a video like this on other continents, like South America or Asia

[@emmettobrien1421]

Pointing to Porto on the map when talking about Lisbon 😐

[@aninditasakti]

How about creating videos about history of cities name in each European Countries. You can make it into series...