Why do many cities and islands in Greece and Cyprus have different anglicised names in English?

Question

I have noticed that many major cities and islands in Greece and Cyprus have anglicised versions. For example:

Athens instead of Athina

Salonica instead of Thessaloniki

Nicosia instead of Lefkosia

Famagusta instead of Ammochostos

Corfu instead of Kerkyra

Crete instead of Kriti

The list is endless. Why didn't they just call the capital 'Athina' instead of changing it to 'Athens'?

Answer 1

And Thessaloniki isn't? The original of name Thessaloniki is that. Didn't you know that?

Θεσσαλονίκη - Θεσσαλίας νίκη (Victory of Thessaly)

As for Κρήτη, the English term "Crete" has the same pronunciation with the Greek one.

Edit: Lady S is right. The question was indeed stupid..

Answer 2

i dont think your question is stupid ,but certainly misinformed or querryable at least on your behalf..which is admirable..i like  it when people ask as to why..well.... i can go through alot of list of words to set an example..etymolgy has a purpusoe in history it litrally give the history of the word and its begins and its true meaning...BUT yes all foreingners will adopt thier own version of a word.. ....i mean i will cut this short and brign you one of the more complex words interperted from greek to english..... and that is  a historical name of.....ODESSIAS  in greek ..yet in english it becomes..ULLYSEUS........how is that possible? the whole structure of the name dose not even add up grammatacly? ..the greek  etymology of ODEYSSIAS means ODIGOS...ie:PILOT./DRIVER....how did the english get ullyseus out of odeyssias ..i will never know !!unless when they first heard it from the very first source from greek or some one who knew greek litreature mispronunced it and it sounded to them as ullyseus....ULLY...dose not look anywhere  near or sound to me at least like  ODEY.... the last part of the name has similaritys but the first part is confusiing in its interpertation....i really do think words are missinterpeted ...some would i say people are too lazy to comprehedn or base thier own version on it but not all...most words are as close as they can be interperted to antoher laungage depending on thier vocals and guttering..but again i strees  the original words are mostly missinterped..when converted to greek to english  for example.. not that other nations words are not miss interpted..i think we all have that promblem.. world wide..i for instance can read spanish very flutenly ..and its easy for me..but i get gigles from listeingners when i read ..beacuse the way i diliverer it its sounds comical to them..you see that is what is called custom...to get to know how things are done ..but i heard worse from greek to english ..or english words to greek ..omg..lol..

Answer 3

This is not the case with Greece&Cyprus only; it is a well known&well established way of the world, since the beginning of time&different languages.

Place names get translated in many languages. The English say "Moscow," not "Moskva"; would we say that "Moskva" is more correct, or just that "Moscow" is correct in English and "Moskva" in Russian? Russians say "Reem" instead of "Roma," just as the English say "Rome." The French say "Londres" instead of "London." Russians pronounce "Warszawa" much like Poles do (despite having a different alphabet), while English speakers say "Warsaw." The Poles retaliate by calling Italy "Włochy." Deutschland can be Allemagne, Germany, or Nemechyna (transliteration from Ukrainian imprecise), and while the Italians call it Germania, they call Germans - Tedeschi! Personally I find the most curious one "Monaco" - the way Munchen, or Munich is called in Italian.

It would create more confusion if everybody insisted on their local pronunciation, aside from the issues arising such as political correctness or even ideology... I'm not aware that there's a conversion source though.

It would almost mean knowing a word of two in all these languages, and the idea of using our mother tongue is exactly to facilitate communication. By 'translating' or more often 'adjusting' foreign countries/place and other proper names we help better understanding. And the original name can always be found if you want to.

And Athens [ˈæθn̩s] is Αθήνα, Athina [aˈθina] in its original, Greek orthography and pronunciation, not really that different from Athens, Atina or any other way it is pronounced in other languages that exist since the Tower of Babel. They make the world a richer and more versatile place, battling the uniformity.

Answer 4

Goxy is right.

Not only Greek and Cypriot names get anglicised; others do too. Also, it doesn't only happen in English, I guess it happens in all languages, including my own (Bosnian or Serbian or Croatian... you choose, since it's the same language, LOL). For example, we call Rome "Rim", Vienna "Beč", Budapest "Budimpešta" etc. And you guys in Greece change the names too according to your language. Let's take Belgrade for example (English name), we call it Beograd here in ex-Yugoslavia, Greeks call it Veligradi... right? Or, you call London "Londino", and many other things.

I can't believe that Frank B got so many thumbs down, actually his answer is pretty good. You call English people lazy for calling Greek towns in their own language, but actually you people do the same thing, and as a matter of fact, the whole world does. People adjust the names of the places to their own languages.

To Cort: I didn't say his question was stupid. By the way, English "Crete" doesn't sound the same as Greek "Kriti"; there is not that last "i" sound in the English version, and the first "i" sound is longer.

Answer 5

The answer is very simple I'm afraid. British being lazy to pronounce words that do not fit to their liking are easy to change the names to what seems fit for them.

For Kerkyra where I come from, the word Corfu has some historical explanations.  

According to Wikipedia an explanation is as follows.

The island is steeped in history and perennially connected to the history of Greece from the beginning of Greek mythology. Its Greek name, Kerkyra or Korkyra, is connected to two powerful water symbols: Poseidon, god of the sea and Asopos, an important Greek mainland river.[3] According to myth, Poseidon fell in love with the beautiful nymph Korkyra, daughter of Asopus and river nymph Metope, and abducted her, as was the custom among gods of the era's myths – Zeus himself was a serial offender.[3] Poseidon brought her to the hitherto unnamed island and, in marital bliss, offered her name to the place: Korkyra,[3] which gradually evolved to Kerkyra (Doric).[4] Together, they had a child they called Phaiax, after whom the inhabitants of the island were named: Phaiakes, which was then transliterated via Latin to Phaeacians.

Many centuries ago, during the Venetian occupation he name Coryfo or Koryfo became predominant. A popular explanation is this:

One, is that, the old fortress of the island's city has two tops, Koryfes in Greek , thus the name deriving from that conjuction.Koryfes, Koryfo, Corfu.

The other is that the highest mountain of the island also has two "koryfes". The coherence here too, is obvious.

Later on, 19c, under British rule the name Corfu was the name it was referred to in the official sitings. That  was rectified when the Ionian Islands passed to Greek sovereignity and the original ancient name was restored.

However, during the mid 20c, the name Corfu was back in use for the convinience of the foreign visitors.

Athens and Salonica are rather simplified versions of their original names.

Answer 6

Zantes instead of Zakynthos,Rhodes instead of Rodos and so on....

I don't now....as soon as i learn i will inform you....!maybe they want to adapt these Greek and popular places in their own language.....For example why don't they change the name of the island  Egina to ....I Became....it would probably sound more English...wouldn't it?

Answer 7

Frank gives a good explanation but one of his examples is wrong. The name Arsinoe is also Greek, just like the name Ammoxostos.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Famagusta#N...

Edit: in the examples of Kerkyra and Thessaloniki we have new names from the same root. This is not hapening in the example of Arsinoe - Ammoxostos and for the record, nobody renamed the city from Arsinoe  to Ammoxostos but it was Salamina (the Ancient Greek name) to Arsinoe (the hellenistic name), then Konstantia (the Byzantine name) and in the end Ammoxostos (the modern name). Different name in different historical times and with new relocations of the city to the east.

If cort is talking to me, of course I know where the name came from. King Philip name his daughter like that after his victory in Thessaly. The city was name after the daughter who was named after the victory.

This question is not stupid at all. In some cases the name of the city is a translation from the Greek, in some other cases there is a history behind the name. Nicosia and Famagusta were the names given to the cities by the medievil foreign rulers of Cyprus and it's not a translation. I advise you to search for each city if you want to know the story.

Answer 8

For the same reason that Greeks changed:

"Arsinoe" to "Ammochostos",

"Selanik" to "Thessaloniki"

"Korkyra" to "Kerkyra"



and for the same reason, so many names of foreign cities and countries sound different in Greek: (Pekino/Beijing, France/Gallia, Deutchland/Germania). Of course there is a connection if one knows the history. For instance Famagusta derives from the Turkish name Mağusa. Should I also remind that Corfu and Zante were the official names of these islands for hundreds of years in the medieval times?

Names do change because people, history and culture change and we better be serious and do some research first rather than appear naive saying stupid things..such as "English are lazy...".  

Otherwise "Crete" to 'Kriti" comes from people as lazy as those saying "Londino" to "London",  "Varkeloni" to "Barcelona", "Lissavona" to "Lisboa" and "Constantinople" to "Instanbul".

I am surprised with some answers in here...

Net: the example of Arsinoe was correct and was meant to show that even Greeks change their own names...! Korkyra is Greek too...

Cort: Of course...Thessaloniki too. All three names I gave were mentioned for the same reason. From Therma to Thessaloniki to Selanik to Thessaloniki and still some Greeks still use today the more Turkish version "Saloniki".