Is it a coincidence that all the continents' names start and end with the same letter
- Thread starter alexb123
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don't forget North America and South America. There is no continent named just 'America'.
Europe starts with an E and ends in an e.
Thats true, but North and South are Geographical locations rather than names. So in some ways it does still stand.
Not really. North America is one continent. South America is one continent.
America is not a continent.
Saying that America is one continent is like saying Carolina or Dakota is one state.
The closest you can get to your logic is by referring to BOTH continents as the 'Americas'.
Fraggle Rocker
Staff member
You're talking about the names of the continents in English. In Chinese, all the continent names end in zhou. Coincidence? Duh, zhou is the Chinese word for "continent." 
Europa and Asia were named by the ancient Greeks after female figures in their mythology. Female names end in A. Africa was named by the Romans, after the various peoples who called themselves Afri. The ending -ca is just a grammatical form meaning "country."
The rest of the continents were given Latin names by European scientists. Australia, from Latin australis, "southern," with an A added to make it a noun. Since other Latin geographical names are feminine (Britannia, Francia, Iberia, Germania, Italia, Scandinavia, China, India, Persia, etc.), they continued the tradition.
The continent at the south pole. Well, it should be named after the Latin word for "southern," so it would be Australia. Hmmm. Already used that one! Okay, how about Antarctica, from Greek anti- and arktikos, literally "the opposite of northern." Arktos means "bear," as the constellation the Great Bear marks the north. In America with our charming homespun ways we call it the Big Dipper.
And America, named after Americus Vespucius, the Latinized form of Amerigo Vespucci, an explorer who came here after Columbus. Why Vespucci got two whole continents and a country named after him while Columbus only has the nation of Colombia and a District, is not clear. But since Columbus died believing that he'd found the eastern route to India and had named the indigenous people indios, he's not exactly an authority.
America and Antarctica are pretty lame as names go. Perhaps there is a conspiracy.
BTW, we say Europe instead of Europa because we got the name from the Norman French when they conquered England in 1066. In French all those A's have been changed to silent E's: Europe, Afrique, Asie, Australie, Amerique, Antarctique.
Europa and Asia were named by the ancient Greeks after female figures in their mythology. Female names end in A. Africa was named by the Romans, after the various peoples who called themselves Afri. The ending -ca is just a grammatical form meaning "country."
The rest of the continents were given Latin names by European scientists. Australia, from Latin australis, "southern," with an A added to make it a noun. Since other Latin geographical names are feminine (Britannia, Francia, Iberia, Germania, Italia, Scandinavia, China, India, Persia, etc.), they continued the tradition.
The continent at the south pole. Well, it should be named after the Latin word for "southern," so it would be Australia. Hmmm. Already used that one! Okay, how about Antarctica, from Greek anti- and arktikos, literally "the opposite of northern." Arktos means "bear," as the constellation the Great Bear marks the north. In America with our charming homespun ways we call it the Big Dipper.
And America, named after Americus Vespucius, the Latinized form of Amerigo Vespucci, an explorer who came here after Columbus. Why Vespucci got two whole continents and a country named after him while Columbus only has the nation of Colombia and a District, is not clear. But since Columbus died believing that he'd found the eastern route to India and had named the indigenous people indios, he's not exactly an authority.
America and Antarctica are pretty lame as names go. Perhaps there is a conspiracy.
BTW, we say Europe instead of Europa because we got the name from the Norman French when they conquered England in 1066. In French all those A's have been changed to silent E's: Europe, Afrique, Asie, Australie, Amerique, Antarctique.
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Fraggle Rocker
Staff member
Well thanks, but I cannot take full credit for this. I went to a Star Fleet hospital and had them perform experimental surgery. As a result, my brain has been cybernetically augmented. This provides instantaneous access to exabytes of information that I never learned, which in fact is actually stored digitally rather than organically.
It's a new top-secret technology called the internet.