Eccentric Star

 

The word Nippon means “land of the rising sun.” The people who live to the east of Korea have called themselves by this name for hundreds and hundreds of years. So, why do we call this place “Japan?” In the early 1300’s, Marco Polo called Japan “Cipangu,” which was probably similar to what the Chinese were calling it at the time. Later, Portuguese explorers would have heard Indonesians call it “Jepang” or something like that. Did no one bother to ask the people living there what they wanted to be called? “Deutschland” means “land of the people.” I’m not really sure why we don’t call them that. The Romans called this whole area “Germania,” from a Celtic (or possibly Gallic) word that means “neighbors.” Poland calls it “Niemcy,” meaning “the silent ones,” which I find more than a little creepy. Nearly everyone else calls Germany a variation of “Alemania.” I suspect that means “those guys over there who make good beer.”