CzechMate
Chintz?
Czechitout?
Czechsum?
Czechers?
Czechbounced?
Czechplease?
The British government will start referring to Czechia rather than the Czech Republic, following advice from an official committee. The Permanent Committee on Geographical Names “establishes and applies the principles by which foreign geographical names (toponyms) should be written”. It is now advising use of Czechia in place …
When I was (briefly) at University in the UK, I was out walking one time into the countryside. A guy with his family in car stopped me. He turned out to be Australian. He asked me if I knew the way to 'Looga-ba-rooga'.
I never really looked at Loughborough quite the same again :-).
Walking with a friend in Sarf Lunnun an American lady asked for directions to Fort Neef.
It was only when my very puzzled friend repeated the name in his distinctly Croydonian tones that I could point out that the address her brother-in-law had given her by phone was Thornton Heath ...
I don't quite get this. It's our language so it's our choice which name we choose.... isn't it? We haven't got the equivalent of the French academy so we can't be told what we should use either.
That's the only way you can explain us using, for example, the we we use the Francophone Bruges despite it being in Flanders but the Flemish name for Zebrugge.
"Česko" is what most Czechs refer to their home country as when speaking Czech, "Česká Republika" is what's on the banknotes and passports, but is hardly never used in day-to-day life (although you do see "čR" frequently used in print as an abbreviation).
As I understand it, Vaclav Havel's objection was to the use of the name "Česko" as the international name for the country, and it's because the "-co" ending makes it sound like the name of a business, not a country.
It's surprising it took so long for "Czechia" to appear: it just substitutes the Czech "-sko" with its international equivalent, "-ia" and so preserves the meaning of "Czech-land". In the German language, "Tschechia" (same pronunciation) is commonly used as the name of the country already, so there's a precedent there in two of the country's neighbours.
... but yes - many, many Czechs really don't like the new name.
Well, it's a little similar to the 'Great Britain' or 'UK'. Calling the whole area 'England' would be quite likely frowned upon. At least by Scots, Welsh, you name it.
Czech Republic/Czechia actually consists of former Kingdom of Bohemia, Moravian Mark and small part of Duchy/ies of Silesia.
Moravians and Silesians (in Czechia) do speak Czech (kind of, hee, hee :), but Moravians (mainly) actually prefer the others to recognize they are still a thing and they fiercely opposed the idea of Czech Republic being called 'Bohemia'. And that's it.
It's pronounced Checkia, not Chechia. How do you pronounce the 'ch' in Czech Republic? How do you pronounce it in Czechoslovakia? Why would you now pronounce Czechia so differently?
All those upvoters must have left their brains in the pub. Still, that's one way of approaching the weekend...
It's pronounced Checkia, not Chechia. How do you pronounce the 'ch' in Czech Republic? How do you pronounce it in Czechoslovakia? Why would you now pronounce Czechia so differently?
All those upvoters must have left their brains in the pub. Still, that's one way of approaching the weekend...
You're right, in that in this instance the 'ch' should be pronounced 'ck', but most people, me included, when seeing 'chia' automatically think 'ch' and not 'ck'. So the Czech people will have to contend with the rest of the world pronouncing their country name wrong. At the moment, when I see 'Czech Republic' I think 'Check'. It would take a humungous education effort to get the rest of the world's population to get the pronunciation of 'Czechia' right, as in 'Checkia'. That or the spelling needs to be changed to the latter so the rest of the world gets it right from day one.
All this doesn't even begin to deal with 'Cz' being pronounced 'Ch' (though most people seem to know that one).
I, for one, would not mind giving a tribute to ČZ motorcycles. Happy memories.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Česká_zbrojovka_Strakonice
Maybe renaming the whole country after them would be a bit excessive, but certainly not the worst idea around.
I would like to see it pronounced as CZ ( See Zed) after the fantastic pistols that they produce.
As a happy CZ Shadow SP01 owner, I couldn't be more pleased with CZ, as for many like me, it glistens with quality.
The Latin language survived long after Rome fell, and was used in places that never saw the Empire's rule.
Throughout the early medieval period, the "Czech lands" were firmly within the Holy Roman Empire ("... of the German peoples"), and while that state itself was neither holy, nor Roman, nor really an Empire*, it kept Latin as its language of state.
( * someone was going to say it, so I decided to get in first)
"Čech" of course exists in Czech and the digraph is pronounced /x/ (that's supposed to be a Greek letter chi). So is Czechia pronounced with a fricative (/x/) or a stop (/k/)? Or is it up to the individual speaker (in which case I'll pronounce it "Czech Republic")?