Renaming Countries and Cities Across the Planet: "There is no neutral, non-political way to refer to almost any square of the globe; Most names annoy somebody"

Already many years ago, I used to joke that the Germans are so belligerant and start so many wars because nobody calls the nation by its proper name. Even worse: every language seems to have a totally different name for the country. Thus, Deutschland in German becomes Allemagne in French, Tyskland in Danish, Germany in English, Germania in Italian which indeed sounds exactly like the English except that the word for the Germans (for the German people) is… gli Tedeschi. 

In that perspective, The Economist asks: Will India change its name to Bharat?

During the G20 summit in Delhi, on September 9th and 10th [2023], Narendra Modi, the prime minister, sat behind a nameplate inscribed with “Bharat”, the Hindi name for India.

 … Why might the BJP [the Bharatiya Janata Party] want to rebrand India?

Bharat is already a widely used synonym for India, at least within the country. The constitution begins with the phrase “India, that is Bharat”. The national anthem uses the name too. The word’s etymological roots are in Sanskrit, an ancient language from which most modern Indian tongues have emerged. Consequently, the country is referred to as Bharat in most local vernaculars. 

 … But although the name India may be associated with British rule, its use far predates that period. The ancient Greeks are believed to have called the subcontinent “Indus”, in reference to the river that flows through it. “Indus” itself comes from a Sanskrit word for the river, sindhu.

The Economist's Banyan adds that

The constitution of India begins: “India, that is Bharat, shall be a union of states.” Unable to agree on whether to use the English or Sanskrit name for the country, its authors included both. On the surface, the difference is no greater than that between Germany and Deutschland. But from the debates in the constituent assembly 75 years ago until today, India’s alternative names have been loaded with distinct meanings. One was imposed by a colonial power and is increasingly associated in India with an out-of-touch anglicised elite. The other is increasingly considered a true reflection of a proud, ancient civilisation.

As this is happening around the globe — notably in 2021 when Turkey's "Erdogan decreed that his country would henceforth be known to the rest of the world as Türkiye, as it is in Turkish" — The Economist's Johnson decided to issue A guide to renamed cities. 

Almost any place’s true name can be a matter for discussion. Three of Turkey’s neighbours officially call themselves Hellas, Sakartvelo and Hayastan—better known as Greece, Georgia and Armenia in English. Meanwhile Hindistan, the name for India in Turkish, can also mean “the country of turkeys”. There is no neutral, non-political way to refer to almost any square of the globe. Most names annoy somebody.

This is most obvious when a territory goes from belonging to one state to another. Westerners were accustomed to referring to cities in Ukraine as Kiev, Kharkov and Lvov. Some grumble at having to learn new names for them—Kyiv, Kharkiv and Lviv. But the old ones were not neutral. They were Russian, and after the country became independent many of its people wanted the Ukrainian versions to be used even in English. Outsiders’ decision to use Ukrainian place-names is now a political declaration of support for Ukraine’s very right to exist.

 … Some calls for change involve colonial names or spellings that were imposed by outsiders. India-watchers have had to adjust to Mumbai (once Bombay), Kolkata (Calcutta) and Chennai (Madras), while remembering that institutions like the Bombay Stock Exchange and the University of Madras continue to use their old monikers. Such renamings often purport to hark back to an unsullied past, but are really exercises in nationalist myth-making. Sometimes they are inarguable. Citizens of the Democratic Republic of Congo (once Zaire) understandably wanted to rename their capital, Leopoldville, which recalled a Belgian ruler whose name was a byword for the worst in colonial brutality. It is now Kinshasa.

 … The Czech Republic has a one-word name in Czech (Česko), and so the Czechs have asked for their country to be called Czechia in English. This has yet to catch on.

Populists and autocrats may think they can dictate place-names, but no amount of decrees can force people to say Türkiye instead of Turkey.