• norimee@lemmy.world
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    3 months ago

    Deutschland is a fairly new word. Before that there were a multitude of germanic tribes and those have made their way into the language of our neighbours as the name of the country

    Germanen, Allemannen, Sachsen to name a few.

    Deutsch, Tysk, Tedesco… come from the Latin “theudo” - “das Volk/the people”

    • SkunkWorkz@lemmy.world
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      3 months ago

      Also why the Nederlanders are called Dutch by English speakers. Since the Dutch descent from a bunch of Germanic tribes.

      • norimee@lemmy.world
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        3 months ago

        Dutch has the same word origin as Deutsch. Obviously. The Latin “theudo” - “the people”.

        Back in the days, when the whole region belonged to the Holy Roman Empire and were not seperate countries yet, “dutch” refered to Nederlanders and germans both. The fact that they decent from germanic tribes is the reason the word “dutch” makes sense actually.

        I find it way more weird that they call Deutsche germans now. Keeping the word dutch for germans would make much more sense in my opinion.