Who decides what the name will be of a city in a foreign language?

[ndee]

In Germany, there is "München" and in English, it's "Munich". Or "Köln" and "Cologne". Who comes up with those names? Cuz Köln and Cologne look and sound totally different.

 

[Chaotic42]

I think that many times it's just messed up when it's passed down. Koln slowly became Colonge over the years.
Some are just completely wrong (Mosow should be Moskva)
Sometimes there aren't sounds in a language (Havanna is Gavanna in Russian)

 

[ndee]

Originally posted by: Chaotic42
I think that many times it's just messed up when it's passed down. Koln slowly became Colonge over the years.
Some are just completely wrong (Mosow should be Moskva)
Sometimes there aren't sounds in a language (Havanna is Gavanna in Russian)

but WHO decides that it is Gavanna in Russian? Weird question, I know

 

[Chaotic42]

Originally posted by: ndee

Originally posted by: Chaotic42
I think that many times it's just messed up when it's passed down. Koln slowly became Colonge over the years.
Some are just completely wrong (Mosow should be Moskva)
Sometimes there aren't sounds in a language (Havanna is Gavanna in Russian)

but WHO decides that it is Gavanna in Russian? Weird question, I know

Because it's the closest they can get to Havanna. Russian doesn't have an "H" sound. It was either going to be Gavanna or Khavanna, I guess.

As for who, I guess the mapmakers.

 

[DrPizza]

That's a question that always bothered me in Spanish class.... why don't we call it Espania, instead of Spain? How did the spanish ever let them get away with that?

 

[Booster]

Originally posted by: DrPizza
That's a question that always bothered me in Spanish class.... why don't we call it Espania, instead of Spain? How did the spanish ever let them get away with that?

It's difficult to pronounce a foreign word, thus it has to be adopted to the local language to be pronounced more easy (however, this isn't always the case since in the past it was next thing to impossible to pronounce complex words correctly for illiterate people).

 

[Buttzilla]

people who speak english can't pronounce those words.

 

[halik]

i have a related question - how do you get from 'gruzniya' [gru-znee-yah] to 'georgia' ? (im talking about the country that was a part of soviet republics). Georgie is a state in the US and those two arent nowhere near close to each other.