List Of Continent Name Etymologies

This is a list of the etymologies of continent names as they are currently found on Earth.

Africa

The name ''Africa'' was originally used by the ancient Romans to refer to the northern part of the continent that corresponds to modern-day Tunisia. There are many theories regarding its origin.

* ''Africa terra'' means "land of the Afri" (plural, or "Afer" singular), referring to the Afri tribe, who dwelt in Northern Africa around the area of Carthage. Their name might come from Phoenician ''afar'' "dust”.
* Greek ''aphrike'' (*ἀφρίκη) "without cold". This was proposed by historian Leo Africanus (1488-1554), who suggested the Greek word ''phrike'' (φρίκη, meaning "cold and horror"), combined with the negating prefix "a-", thus indicating a land free of cold and horror. However, as the change of sound from ''ph'' to ''f'' in Greek is datable to about the 10th century, it is unlikely this is the origin.
* Latin ''aprica'' "sunny".
* Another suggestion is that the name comes from the Ancient Egyptian word ''afruika'' - which means 'turning towards the ka' or 'turning towards the birthplace' or 'motherland' of humanity.

The name "Africa" began to be stretched to encompass a larger area when the provinces of Tripolitania, Numidia and Mauretania Caesariensis were subdued to the Diocesis of Africa, following the administrative restructuring of Diocletian. Later, when Justinian I reconquered lands of the former West Roman Empire, all the regions from the Chelif River to the Gulf of Sidra were annexed to the Byzantine Empire as the "Exarchate of Africa".

During the Middle Ages, as the Europeans increased their knowledge and awareness of the size of the African continent, they progressively extended the name of Africa to the rest of the continent.

America

The continent of America is thought to be named after the Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci (who styled himself ''Americus Vespucius'' in Latin). Amerigo Vespucci was named after Saint Emeric of Hungary. Vespucci, following his four voyages exploring the coastlines of Venezuela and Brazil, first developed the idea that the newly discovered western land was in fact a continent. The German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller created the earliest known map showing the name ''America'', which he applied to the South American continent only.
The 1594 map by Petrus Plancius labels the two landmasses "America Mexicana" and "America Peruana", two terms still used in the 17th century.

In the late 19th century, it was theorized that the name could have been patterned on the Mayan language for the Amerrisque Mountains in present-day Nicaragua.

An alternative theory was proposed by the local Bristol antiquarian Alfred Hudd who proposed that the word America had evolved from Amerike or ap Meryk, based on a lost manuscript which he claimed to have seen. Alfred Hudd was an aristocrat who belonged to the Clifton Antiquarian Club of Bristol, founded in 1884 to arrange meetings and excursions for the study of objects of archaeological interest in the West of England and South Wales. He also collected butterflies, was a naturalist and member of the Bristol Naturalists' Society. Hudd proposed that the word "America" was originally applied to a destination across the western ocean, possibly an island or a fishing station in Newfoundland. After the king of Denmark and ruler of Iceland had cut off trade for fish, England sent out expeditions to find new sources. Hudd suggested Amerike's sponsorship made his name known in Bristol in association with the North American destinations prior to other mapmaking or voyages. The writer Jonathan Cohen noted he made a conjectural leap to reach that conclusion, and no extant evidence supports it. In the 21st century, the scholar John Davies briefly mentioned the story as a kind of Welsh patriot piece.

Antarctica

The word ''Antarctica'' comes from Greek ''antarktikos'' (ἀνταρκτικός), from ''anti'' (ἀντί) and ''arktikos'' (ἀρκτικός) "Arctic". Literally "opposite to the Arctic (opposite to the North)". ''Arktikos'' comes from ''Arktos'', the Greek name for the constellation of the Great Bear Ursa Major, visible only in the Northern Hemisphere, which comes from the ancient Greek word ἄρκτος (), which means "bear".

Asia

The word ''Asia'' originated from the Ancient Greek word Ἀσία, first attributed to Herodotus (about 440 BCE) in reference to Anatolia or to the Persian Empire, in contrast to Greece and Egypt.

It originally was just a name for the east bank of the Aegean Sea, an area known to the Hittites as Assuwa. In early Classical times, the Greeks started using the term "Asia" to refer to the whole region known today as Anatolia (the peninsula which forms the Asian portion of present-day Turkey). The Roman Empire referred to the entire Lydian region of what is now northwestern Turkey as the province of Asia. Eventually, however, the name had been stretched progressively further east, until it came to encompass the much larger land area with which we associate it today, while the Anatolian Peninsula started being called "Asia Minor" or "The Lesser Asia" instead.

The deeper root of the etymology can only be guessed at. The following two possibilities have been suggested:
* It could have originated from the Aegean root "''Asis''" which means "muddy and silty" as a description of the eastern shores of the Aegean Sea.
* It could derive from the borrowed Semitic root "''Asu''", which means varyingly "rising" or "light", of course a directional referring to the sunrise, Asia thus meaning 'Eastern Land'.

However, since the Greek name ''Asia'' is in all likelihood related to Hittite Assuwa, the etymology of one has to account for the other as well.

Personified in Greek mythology by the deity of the same name.

Australia

The word ''Australia'' means "Southern Land" in New Latin, adapted from the legendary pseudo-geographical '' Terra Australis Incognita'' ("Unknown Southern Land") dating back to the Roman era. First appearing as a corruption of the Spanish name for an island in Vanuatu in 1625, "Australia" was slowly popularized following the advocacy of the British explorer Matthew Flinders in his 1814 description of his circumnavigation of the island.Flinders, Matthew.
A Voyage to Terra Australis
''. 1814. Lachlan Macquarie, a Governor of New South Wales, used the word in his dispatches to England and recommended it be formally adopted by the Colonial Office in 1817. The Admiralty agreed seven years later and the continent became officially known as Australia in 1824.

Europe

Greek (''Eurṓpē'') contains the elements εὐρύς (''eurus''), "wide, broad" and ὤψ/ὠπ-/ὀπτ- (''ōps''/''ōp''-/''opt-'') "eye, face, countenance". ''Broad'' has been an epithet of Earth herself in the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European religion.

It is common in ancient Greek mythology and geography to identify lands or rivers with female figures. Thus, ''Europa'' is first used in a geographic context in the Homeric Hymn to Delian Apollo, in reference to the western shore of the Aegean Sea.
As a name for a part of the known world, it is first used in the 6th century BC by Anaximander and Hecataeus.
The weakness of an etymology with εὐρύς (''eurus''), is 1. that the -u stem of εὐρύς disappears in Εὐρώπη Europa and 2. the expected form εὐρυώπη euryopa that retains the -u stem in fact exists.

An alternative suggestion due to Ernest Klein and Giovanni Semerano (1966) attempted to connect a Semitic term for "west", Akkadian ''erebu'' meaning "to go down, set" (in reference to the sun), Phoenician '' 'ereb'' "evening; west", which would parallel ''occident'' (the resemblance to ''Erebus'', from PIE ''*h₁regʷos'', "darkness", is accidental, however). Barry (1999) adduces the word ''Ereb'' on an Assyrian stele with the meaning of "night", " he country ofsunset", in opposition to ''Asu'' " he country ofsunrise", i.e. Asia (Anatolia coming equally from Ἀνατολή, "(sun)rise", "east"). This proposal is mostly considered unlikely or untenable.

Oceania

The word ''Oceania'' comes from the English word ocean for 'a large body of water'. It is ultimately derived from Greek Ὠκεανός (''Okeanos''), the great river or sea surrounding the disk of the Earth. Personified, in Greek Mythology, as Oceanus, son of Uranus and Gaia and husband of Tethys.

Other

Zealandia

Zealandia (), also known as the New Zealand continent or Tasmantis, is a nearly submerged continental fragment that sank after breaking away from Australia 60–85 Ma (million years) ago, and most of it (93%) remains submerged beneath the Pacific Ocean. It derives its name from the island country of New Zealand which occupies the vast majority of its non-submerged land. Dutch explorers named the land ''Nova Zeelandia'' after the Dutch province of Zeeland, and British explorer James Cook subsequently anglicised the name to New Zealand.

Pangaea

The name ''Pangaea/Pangea'' is derived from Ancient Greek ''pan'' (, "all, entire, whole") and ''Gaia'' (, "Mother Earth, land"). The word was allegedly coined by German meteorologist Alfred L. Wegener in 1915. The name was meant to imply the all-encompassing nature of Pangaea, that all the earth (landmass) on the planet at the time was encompassed within the Supercontinent.

See also

* Toponymy
* Etymology
* Onomatology
* List of country name etymologies
* Lists of etymologies
* List of river name etymologies

Notes

References

External links

Map of Selected Placename Etymologies in the Americas, from www.radicalcartography.net

{{DEFAULTSORT:List Of Continent Name Etymologies

Continent name
Lists of continents