Budapest: One City Two Names 

If you live in the city (or have visited it) which do you prefer? Buda or Pest?

As a Hungarian, can I just correct all of you foreigners saying Budapest with an english S sound, and tell you it is actually BudapeSHt with an English SH sound? :)

Bruh when he split the words apart I read it as newsrail and paperroad even

I can 100% recommend visiting Budapest, the nightlife, the history, the baths, the people I absolutely fell in love with the city

The name of Pest is actually pronounced Pesht.

Message me when you visit, dude! - A fan from Hungary In the 19th century it was often referred as Pest-Buda, but had they kept that name, "Pest" would have been written over Buda and vice versa on the map.

My mum was raised in Hungary in Budapest and she was actually a worker on the childrens railway and when we visited and went on the train she kept pointing out strange things that I wouldn’t have even noticed Just thought that was quite cool

As a hungarian I always wondered what Pest could mean. But for Buda, theres a myth, that I always adored! In short, it goes like this: Buda was the older brother of Attila the Hun, with whom Buda had some family issues, and in the end, the brothers settled it in the old way. But, as Attila was quite remorseful, he named Buda after his dead brother.

I've heard that Pest should come from the hot springs like in that part of town

Buda-from water Pest-from fire (furnace etc) Budapest-The City of Water and Fire 🤯 (I’m not from Budapest or Hungary)

Széchenyi actually wrote that when he was coming up with the name for this new city he eventually narrowed down to Budapest and Pestbuda. He states that the reasons for choosing the first one are the following: Pestbuda would have a collision of consonants in the middle making it difficult to pronounce. If Pestbuda would have been written on a north-south map it would have been exactly the other way around as the old cities, Buda being on the left side, coming first, and Pest on the right side, coming second. He came up with interesting ideas actually, some of them are:"Buda is, Pest is" - loosely translates to "Buda as well as Pest". The problem with this was that the word Pestis is actually the name of the black death in hungarian so he gave up this idea. Another one was "Honderű". This means something like "brightness of the motherland". He actually setlled for this solution at first but somebody let him know that in french it would mean honte (shame) rues (streets). So he finally decided that Budapest would be the best name. Guess he was right.

Buda (408? - 445) is the name of the brother of Attila the hun. The city have its name after him, according to chronicles. The Pest theory is more likely accurate. Also I know these are different languages, but Pest you pronounce "pesht".

I kind of hoped you'd mention other two-part place names too, like Jerusalem (Ierus + Salem)... oh well, maybe next time

Imagine a Buddhist first hearing about 'Pestbuda', their beloved god turned into a symbol of disease

U have actually missed something that i didn't even know till' i had my final exam on the astro-hungarian-empire, The actuall city had been created around the "Milenium" (the 1000th anniversary of the conquest to controll the carpatia) And it was made up of THREE cities, Buda, Pest, and Óbuda! Óbuda is the old city that was if i remember correctly made by the romans for an easy way to get fresh water. And the other thing is that while in the 18 hundreds it was only that 3 cities, now it has basicaly eaten up more then 15 smaller towns, and it continues to grow

I'm a simple person, I see Name Explain/Hungary and I click

Óbuda was pretty much the "successor" to Aquincum, it just grew much larger.

If you read older books and papers, at least in English, pre-WWII and especially 19th-century, the united city was often explicitly hyphenated Buda-Pest, which is how I realized that it was originally two cities. As time went on this became less frequent; it may have been a style guide issue where some newspapers continued an increasingly archaic usage while others updated to newer practice. Certainly the earlier Pest-Buda is an easier construction in English when the hyphen is included.

Best wishes from Budapest! Thanks the video!

It is my birthday, and I live in Budapest. How awesome is that! 😊

I love this channel because it makes me think of names in a whole entire new perspective. Keep up the good work!

I have a Buda, I have a Pest. Ugh!!! Budapest! (sorry, I really want to do PPAP, anyway)

I've been there a couple of times and I loved it. Definitely recommend anyone that hasn't to go visit. I personally liked the museum at the castle on the Buda side most of all, but there are also a lot of cool things on the Pest side like the huge marketplace and of course many restaurants etc. Also, visiting those roman ruins mentioned in the video is a definite treat.

Yay, you did a video about Hunagry 🇭🇺! Your content is great, keep it up.

You and I remember Budapest very differently. That's actually pretty cool hearing how it was originally 2 cities. Plus the bridge was pretty awesome too

Hey, I live in Budapest and I worked at children's railway! It's awesome, you should wisit it!

As someone who was born and lives in Budapest i can say that you did a good job. But only pest's inner city is the club region (few districts). The outer city is quiet.

I was there like a month ago and I think Budapest is beautiful when Buda and Pest are together and it would be sad if not. I really recommend visiting this wonderful city. But that languague, let's say it's...interesting.

I miss the red star on the Hungarian Parliament

“Not many people choose to live on the Pest side” false. The nightclub part is a very small area and actually most people live in Pest since its at least twice the size of Buda.

I've always heard the city was formed from three cities. óbuda(old Buda), Buda and Pest.

According to some theories, Slavs used to burn chalk or some other material on the east side of the Danube to process it and that is why it comes from the word furnace.

Hűvösvölgy is just one of many kids-themed train routes of the country The usual thing with these is to let the kids have a fun journey while going sightseeing around the rural or mountainous parts of Hungary on school trips.I remember fondly when we put the money together to it (a small fee of about 1-2000 forints per kid,which is about 4-8 dollars) and in the middle of winter we went up over there-everything covered in snow,it was so beautiful it sends me chills down my spine even now when i'm typing about it.

Budapest is objectively easier to pronounce than Pest-Buda, as it doesn't contain a three consonant pile-up. Also, if you're wondering why nobody had built a (permanent) bridge before the 19th century, the river is pretty wide. Lánchíd is AFAIK currently the second shortest bridge in Budapest, and it's still longer than Waterloo Bridge, the longest in London. Before that there had of course been temporary pontoon bridges and ferries, but sometimes in the winter they had to stop using them because of the ice. However, if the ice sheet became thick enough, they'd use it as ice bridges.

A whooole new wooord~

2:18 there is actually one in my hometown of Tyumen in Siberia

A lot of people here in Hungary will say they are going "pestre", so "to pest" and omit the Buda part of the word, I don't know for what reasons but it seems like that is the vernacular, even if the cities are joined!

I see what you did with the reference to George Ezra. While I live in London now I still have my home in Budapest, it's in Buda but in the flat section (the university area). I don't have a preference between the two sides, although I prefer the flat areas so I don't get tired from walking. Also there should always be trams in sight.

Yay, you made a video of my home city, thank you 😍😍😍 Edit: also included a photo of my favourite nightclub 😂😂😂😂

4:09 you say you're naming the countries the danube flows through from east to west and then proceed to name them from west to east.

I prefer Buda as I was born there, even my name is Budai (from Buda), it is much more beautiful and less dangerous, but it's a beautiful city. And it isn't called Óbudapest because that would mean Old Budapest. Nice video, although the s is pronounced as an š sound (ш in Cyrillic)

James May of Top Gear fame, 1st told me about Buda-pest being a compound name. Name Explain expounded on that information, well done!

Visited Budapest this summer and it's my favourite city in central Europe. Gorgeous and pocket friendly. As a tourist it's difficult to see difference between Buda and Pest in a few days though.

1. Béla is not Buda. Both are ancient male names and not related at all. Buda was the brother of King Atilla, and it is said that he established a town in the area along with a necropolis in the nearby Pilis-mountains. And so Buda is the city of Buda (as opposed to the city of Atilla whichwas supposedly somewhere on the Hungarian Plains close to the Tisza river). 2. Aquincum is literally under/near Óbuda. 3. The Hungarian language doesn't like consonant clusters (as opposed to slavic languages), which is why the original name Pest-Buda was flipped around: it obeys the v-c-v-c rhythm of the language. Trust me, im born-and-bread Budapestian 😉

I've been to Budapest but wasn't in the city for long I was only there for sziget festival so wasn't even in the main bit of the city except for a day before the festival

My favorite compound word is Breakfast, never really thought of it as "breaking" a "fast"

⭐🌟💫✨thanks for making informative video

9:38 as to why the name Budapest championed over Pest-Buda, the reason is probably the conventional way of drawing maps where the west is to the left and the east is to the right. So of course Buda will be on the left and Pest on the right. It would create confusion to label the map as Pest-Buda with Pest writen over Buda and Buda over Pest.

If you are in Budapest you should visit the castle of Buda, the parliament, the Danube river, Margit island

I visited in the Spring and I stayed next to St Matthias’ Cathedral in the Buda side. So much more cozy and relaxing than Pest but Pest has more important sites of the Cities

"I'm Budda, this is Pest". Where did I remember this line from? _The Expendables_ ?

5:41 Ever heard of Buda, Texas? According to the Buda tourism website, In 1887, at the request of the post office department, the name of the town was changed to Buda. The common explanation for the new name is that it derives from Spanish word viuda, which translates to widow. The town had gained a reputation as a popular eating and rest stop for rail travelers.The growing town is just south of Austin, the capital of Texas.

Favourite RU-vidr

7:02 I'll tell you. Because it was lit back then too 🔥🔥🔥 12th century party!!!

Funny, Windows 10 recently gave me a log in page with a photo from Budapest and a mention of it being a compound word.

Although your pronunciation was wrong for BudapeSHt I am glad to see ‘Obuda mentioned as it appears not many people know this was it’s own city at one point

The name order probably has to do with the names positioning on the map. Buda is left of Pest so it would look like Budapest.

If you are reading it on a map from left to right, you will see two very close cities: buda and pest. When they united I'm sure they were already used to saying Budapest instead of pestbuda

I live in texas near two citys, one being named Bryan and the other College Station. They are right together and far from anything else and are often referred to as Bryan College Station, or sometimes BCS.

I go to school in Óbuda.

8:36 There have been bridges before, but the Chain Bridge was the first permanent bridge.

The name Buda denoted a settlement built on the site of Aquincum in the early Árpád period, which was only referred to as Óbuda after the Tatar invasion, after the construction of Buda Castle (Újbuda). Our medieval chronicles tell us

I like to think it was called budapest simply because buda is on the left and pest is on the right side(on a map) so even older maps could be used since the names of the cities would be in that order already

Everyday is a compound word that’s an adjective. Though every day I see people make the everyday mistake of using “everyday” instead of “every day”.

I certainly assumed it meant something like, "City of the Buddha" the first time I heard it referred to. It's funny, now, knowing that it's a European city, but it made sense at the time.

I see i was "early" to a video for once.

How did the cardinal directions get their names?

The Children's Railway (Gyermekvasút) was established during the soviet occupation of Hungary and was set up to help the children of the time to do an adults job. The Children's Railway is the worlds longest and most well kept and established children's Railway in the world. It is run much like scouts and every position besides the train driver's and mechanics are children from the age of 10-14. They are supervised by adults, are trained and live in housing on and off for a period of the year. It's a fun little day trip you can do as it brings you around the forested hills of Buda and is accessible by Budapest's amazing public transport. There are also tonnes of hiking trails and look out point and parks, and even castle ruins.

i know this isn’t related to names, but the etymology of “spell” is quite odd for me, in german it is “Buchstabieren”, in french is “orthographier” (if goole translate is correct). Would you consider making a video on this?

At 1:35 I already knew he was thinking about Budapest because buda (booda) and pest (pesht) ( plus the front clicker or whatever it is called

Combining city names has ever happened in Indonesia. It's the capital city of Lampung Province. It originally consists of two cities, "Teluk Betung", which facing the bay (teluk means "bay" in Indonesian), and "Tanjung Karang", just north of Teluk Betung. When this two cities combined, they took the name.. "Tanjungkarang-Telukbetung", combined, with a hyphen in the middle. Then the government realized it's a bad idea and renamed the city to "Bandar Lampung". Back to Budapest, how one city means water and one means fire, creates unique balance. Hope can go there someday.

Once a turist asked me where is the Buddha Bar. And I answered her that I don't know the place but I guess you should cross the river because this is Pest side.

how many times did he say "Buda", "Pest", or "Budapest"?

What does rocket mean if not a rocketship?

my city is also a compound of two cities. My city is Yehud Monson And it's a mix of old Yehud and Nawe Efraim Monson

Obuda is the north, right? I think it s consists mostly of just one island called... i forget... margaret s island? or maybe obuda only starts at margaret and continues further north...

Man what are the odds Name Explain would post this the same day as the Black Widow trailer?

You and I remember PastBuda quite differently

Buda is actually older than Pest, Buda was a fortress in the border of the roman empire and Pest started of as the living quarters for the defenders families. Buda is also on a big hill, but Pest really flat.

I always thought that the name Budapest was named after buddha went to the land that's now Hungary and started a festival there and they named it buddha fest after buddha but buddha says let's change the spelling to Budapest insteaf

I miss this city, full of memories. Szerelték Budapest.

A lot of this remind me of Terry Pratchett's Ankh-Morpork - build-up from the river-related, peaceful and young Ankh and the old, impoverished and dirty Morpork with the exciting nightlife.

What about Innsbruck?

7:00 If I were to guess, it comes from the hot springs that the city of Budapest is well known for

we hear all this "it comes from an old latin/greek/whatever word meaning" but where do those old words come from?

Thanks

Another interesting factoid is that the German (Austrian) name for Buda is actually "Ofen", which is German for "oven". According to Wikipedia that name was originally used für Pest (which makes more sense), but was later carried over to the other side of the Danube during the evacuation of the people in Pest in 1241.

Name Explain should have piggy backed off of the Black Widow trailer released, which heavily features Budapest. Ride that algorithm :D

nice vid

Why does it sound so simillar to Bucharest (capital of Romania)? If there's a reason at all, of course.

It is cool that possible meanings might be Water for Buda, and Fire for Pest. Is like a Pokemón Generation Game should take it as the next logic step after Sword and Shield

I was born in Pest but raised and now live in Buda. For me Bp is the city B is my part P is where my granny lived. People from other parts of the country call the city shortly as Pest though. So when I went to university I made friends from the country who asked me if I was from Pest. I answered, No Im from Buda. Then I got odd looks and lectures how arrogant and snobbish this answer was. :D

So what about butterfly?

I would guess that Budapest won over Pestbuda because if it were just 2 cities being renamed, it would be hard to decide which name would come first. Manhood measuring contests bound to ensue. But where there were 3 cities Obuda AND Buda get to be first. 2/3rds of the parties winding up happy as opposed to 50/50

Park for free in the hills of Buda, walk past the pretty fort and spend the day in the best part of town, Pest.

I used to think that Buda was the more posh part because I used to live in ujpest(💜⚽) , still prefer Pest though.

The best city in Europe (probably not to live, but to visit), affordable and great architecture. 😌

I believe Pest-Buda was dropped because the consonant-cluster in the middle of the word is icky to pronounce.

So it's kind of a Newcastle/Gateshead type of city? Although people from both sides of the Tyne get angry if you call the area "Newcastle/Gateshead".

Please do Syria cause it's really interesting, love your vids btw