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Is Japan Really Called Japan in LN?
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Just saw somewhere that Japan isn't actually called Japan. Supposedly Marco Polo asked China what the island was called, then misheard the guy. He returns to Europe and tells them about the island, and they misheard him. Basically the first game of telephone, centuries before it was invented.
Saw this on the internet, so grain of salt. But is Japan really called Japan in light novels, or is it translated to Japan for English readers?
Powers out, can't sleep, and thankful for the j-novel app on my cell phone.
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@Kurzaa Do you mean 'Is Japan called Japan in Japanese?'
If so, the answer is no. It's Nihon or Nippon, which means Land of the Rising Sun. The origin of the word Japan is debatable, but the Chinese pronunciation of this is one explanation. -
A lot of country names don't stay the same in other languages even if the spelling is the same or similar, it's why you can get some really odd country ordering at the Olympics which has countries enter in alpha order based on the language of the country hosting.
So as has been mentioned, no Japan in Japanese isn't pronounced or spelt Japan, but ostensibly it's the official name of the country in English.
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@jpwong said in Is Japan Really Called Japan in LN?:
A lot of country names don't stay the same in other languages even if the spelling is the same or similar, it's why you can get some really odd country ordering at the Olympics which has countries enter in alpha order based on the language of the country hosting.
Example: Germany = Deutschland
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Wikipedia, of course, has a list of alternate country names.
