Czech Republic to be known as 'Czechia'

[Figueira]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-36048186

They're trying to change the common name in English (and some other languages). I for one hope this catches on.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Very brave. Have they changed their preferred pronouns as well?

[palandio]

Interestingly the politics regarding the common name in German have been different from 1993 on.

Tschechische Republik, which is the direct translation of Česká republika, has been the official name since 1993, similarly to other languages. But at the same time the Ministry of Foreign Affairs already in 1993 has encouraged in a memorandum to its embassies the use of the short form Tschechien in German, designating it as legitime and equivalent. (And indeed all media are using the short form.) The reason for this is that there is another name for the Czech Republic in German that is historically charged, namely Tschechei. You might ask what is the problem with the different ending, given that country names like Slowakei and Türkei are completely normal. The term Tschechei got its negative connotation during the "Erledigung der Rest-Tschechei" (labelled as such by the Nazis), that is the German occupation in March 1939 of what had remained of Czechoslovakia after the Munich agreement and the declaration of Slovak independence.

[ag]

It is the common name in Russian.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Ftr, in Poland we never used "Czech Republic", just "Czechy"

[Mopsus]

"Bohemia-Moravia" would sound better, I think.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

"Bohemia-Moravia" would sound better, I think.

Not after what happened at Munich in 1938.

[Mopsus]

Oh, you Europeans... always living in the past!

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Personally, I think Czechland would be likelier to catch on in English, but I can understand the Czech aversion to the -land suffix. (Sudetenland anyone?)

[Cubby]

I don't like it, Czechia sounds weird. They already changed their name in 1993 (although that involved a boundary change as well). They need to pick a name and stick with it, I'm sure in 10 years they'll change it again for no reason.

"Bohemia-Moravia" would sound better, I think.

That would be better than Czechia, but there's no point in having two names in one. It would be like calling the Netherlands: "Holland-Netherlands" or Spain: "Castile-Spain".

[ag]

Chechia (in whatever spellings) has always been the standard name in whole bunch of languages. Definitely in Russian, Ukrainian, Belorussian, Bulgarian, Romanian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Norwegian, Latin etc. etc. Similar names (something like Chechi in various spellings) are there in Polish, Estonian, Finnish or (Tschechien) in German and some related languages (e.g., Swedish). Czechs themselvs say something that would sound like Chesko, as do the Slovaks and many others.

They should have taken the Latin form for their international name back in 1993. Perhaps, it sounded "too Russian" back then.  But, anyway, it is the proper international name of the country, and it will be easy to get used to.

[Grand Wizard Lizard of the Klan]

Ugh. Sounds creepy.

[Intell]

What's wrong with the current name?

[ag]

What's wrong with the current name?

For instance, that it is the name of a state, not of a country. If Czechs were to make Karel Schwarzenberg their king tomorrow, they would not change their name in Czech (it would still be Cesko) or in Russian/Latin (it would still be Chekhia/Cechia), but they would have to rename themselves in English to Czech Kingdom.

[beaver2.0]

I am in favor of Czech Republic, though Czech Technocracy would be better.

[Citizen Hats]

I'd have to agree with Czechland, it, for whatever reason, sounds like awkward in English and doesn't sound like Chechnya