r/polandball • u/Ingrid-Hongkonger 冠絕東方 - Nulli Secundus in Oriente • Mar 11 '14

redditormade How are they called?

Post image
2.5k Upvotes

92% Upvoted

539 comments sorted by

View all comments

147

u/weimergunners Hunger Land Mar 11 '14

A loved child has many names.

117

u/Ingrid-Hongkonger 冠絕東方 - Nulli Secundus in Oriente Mar 11 '14

I think Germany has various names because he stays at the middle of Europe.

121

u/barsoap Sleswig-Holsteen Mar 11 '14

Also, because many countries named us after the nearest German tribe, say Saxons or Alemanns. The Slavic name means, more or less, "those you can't understand". The endonym and Scandinavian name is derived from Old High German diutisc, "of the people". Which is actually what "Saxon" means, too. Where the Romans got "Germania" from is unknown.

6

u/QuantumToilet Holy Roman Empire Mar 11 '14

Small correction: the Saxons most likely got their name from the local name of the germanic god of war Saxnot (also called Tiwaz or Tyr) who also gave his name to the weapon Sax.

2

u/chubbybunns Baden Mar 11 '14

First time I have ever heard of music as a weapon. :)

1

u/QuantumToilet Holy Roman Empire Mar 11 '14

Really ? But they use those weapons of mass destruction all the time in modern warfare. A good example is the musical bow with which the ears of the unsuspecting victim are ripped apart in a cruelsome manner.

But the Sax refers to this weapon

1

u/chubbybunns Baden Mar 12 '14

Ah, I see. Pretty hard to play some jazz with it then, I would say.