EVERY Capital City Named After People 

How many of these cities have you been to?

Washington DC is a double since District of Columbia comes from Christopher Columbus.

There's a good likelihood that Athena, and Romulus were named after the cities. They were patrons of the cities and took their names

Indonesian capital of Jakarta also somewhat fits the title as well, since the word "Jakarta" comes from "Jayakarta", a vizier of Banten Sultanate

Surprised Simon Bolivar doesn't have any capitals named after him, guess a few countries is enough lol

Syria and Turkey both have a bunch of cities named after the Seleucid dynasty. Laodicea, Seleucia, Apamea, Antiochia etc. (Apart from Alexandretta of course.) Ancient Greeks really loved naming cities after themselves.

Since you've mentioned other Catholic Saints, you might want to include the Capital of Argentina which was named after "Santa Maria de los Buenos Aires" which like "Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles" in California were actually named after the Virgen Mary. Although Los Angeles is nether a National Capital nor a State Capital.

Warsaw is named after Wars and Sava - mythical couple of fisherman and mermaid

Great video! But I think you missed San Marino City, the capital of San Marino. It's named after Marinus, the founder of the country (and the city).

Calling Bishkek the most “dubious entry” after including Athens from Athena is pretty hilarious 😅

You left out San Marino, which is named after Saint Marinus (c 275 - c 366). Georgetown, Guyana is named after George III. The capitol of São Tomé and Príncipe is São Tomé which is named after Saint Thomas aka "Doubting Thomas."

Washington DC is actually a two-for-one deal, because in addition to being named after George Washington, the district in which it's located is Columbia, which was named after Christopher Columbus.

If we're counting saints' names, Buenos Aires could fit in as well. The spaniards originally named it Port of Holy Mary of the Good Winds, hence, it's named in honour of Virgin Mary. Also, for a long time it also was officially referred to as "Trinity City", which didn't stick in

Johannesburg is definitely named after a man named Johann. It’s currently disputed if it was after Johannes Rissik or Johannes Joubert. But the presence of the suffix -burg tells us that the name may have been given by the Dutch rather than by the English. And Johannes might pertain to Saint John.

For many years the capital of the Dominican Republic was named Ciudad Trujillo (pronounced “See you Dad True hee yoh;” ciudad is Spanish for “city”) after the long time dictator Rafael Trujillo. After he died, the capital was renamed Santo Domingo after Saint Dominic, the name given in 1495, shortly after Bartholomew Columbus founded the city (he named it La Nueva Isabela after the Queen of Spain at the time). The country itself is also named after Saint Dominic (La República Dominicana in Spanish). It’s neighbor on the island, Haiti, has a capital named Port-Au-Prince, or “Prince’s Port,” but it is unclear which prince. Some people believed it was named after a sailing ship named Prince. Or maybe the future American rock star? JK LOL

Hey... you missed Sri Jayawardenapura Kotte in Sri Lanka J R Jayawardena was the president of Sri Lanka from 1978 to 1989 and he established the administrative capital in 1982 in the city of "Kotte" renaming it "Sri Jayawardenapura Kotte"

Washington DC was named after 2 people. Washington after George Washington (as mentioned in the video), but also DC, which stands for District of Columbia. Columbia, of course being named after explorer Christopher Columbus

Fun fact: I went to college with a member of the Mwa Lusaka family. Nice guy. This city was only founded in 1906 after the colonial government acquired some land from chief Mwa Lusaka in a promising location that was more central than Livingstone. (The _mwa_ prefix simply means "place of" in the Soli language.)

Norway's capital Oslo was named Christiania until 1925 (spelled with K from 1877). It was named after the Danish King Christian IV.

As a romanian, I'm actually happy you decided to include us. And if you know anything about Romania, our capital city being named after a shepherd makes a lot of sense

The capital of British Columbia is also named Victoria, although it is a provincial capital, not a national one.

Budapest, Hungary was originally 2 cities on either side of the Danube (Buda and Pest). If legend is anything to go by, Buda dates back to the middle ages being the Hungarian version of Bleda who was the brother of Atilla the Hun who invaded and took over the settlement.

No matter your pronunciations, your videos are educational and entertaining, Patrick.

Some of historical names that came to my mind: Constantinopole, Nur-sultan

Nigeria's capital city Abuja is named after a 19th century emirate and its capital city of the same name, which in turn was named after one of its rulers "Abu Jatau". The land on which the modern Abuja was built used to be part of the old Abuja emirate, and the emirate and its capital were renamed "Suleja" (after another emir) in the 1970s when the new capital was chosen and given the name Abuja.

Very interesting! How about the origins of names of countries and/or states or provinces, whether after humans or not? Or rivers? Basically you could turn this into a little series!

Jakarta is named after Prince Jayakarta, a local ruler there during Banten Kingdom times.

Budapest could be on the list - well, if we take the rules a bit loosely. The name Budapest is a combination of the names Buda and Pest (the two cities together with Óbuda were united 150 years ago). Buda is named after a person: Buda or Bleda, the brother of Attila the Hun.

New Delhi might be named after King Dhilu but again not confirmed

What about Bloemfontein, South Africa? It’s one of its capitals. Its etymology is a bit muddled, but could be named after Jan Bloem II

2:03 King William III of Nassau was governor of the Netherlands and king William III of England and Ireland. He was King William II of Scotland. He was also Prince of Orange (in France) and Count of Nassau-Dillenburg (today in Germany, Hessen). His family can be found today in the Princes of Orange and Kings of the Netherlands. In addition, the princes of Luxembourg are related to him. The color orange and the fruit orange are named after the Principality of Orange. The Princes and Counts of Nassau was a German title. The Princes of Nassau Orange were heavily involved in the independence of the Netherlands.

Maputo used to be called Lourenço Marques prior to Mozambique's independence. Lourenço Marques had been a Portuguese explorer to the land.

BTW the Quezon city the place in the Philippines was named after the 2nd president and it was founded himself in 1939

Haha, you said "port , too" and my brain heard "portmanteau", and I was like... what? Oh, my bad! Fun video.

the capital of the state of Penang in Malaysia is George Town.... named after King George III after it was colonised by the British..... also Constatinople was the capital city of the Ottoman Empire....

I used to live on the Isle of Man and I've always been told that the word 'Douglas' came from the 2 rivers that joined up there - river Dhoo and river Glass. Dhoo-Glass = douglas

The thing that surprised me the most was that apparently Bucharest and Budapest, Luanda and Lusaka and Maputo and Maseru don't have similar origins

Algiers is named after its founder Bologhine Ibn Ziri in the 10th century, the "Ziri" name became "Dzayer" which is the arabic name of Algiers !

George Washington was actually named after Washington village in Country Durham. There is Washington old hall which is ancestral home of the Washington family. The village creast is incorporated in District of Colombia creast.

My state capital which is Queensland in Australia Brisbane is named after Sir Thomas Brisbane who was the governor of the colony of New South Wales that was before my state was formed and became independent from New South Wales in 1859

You forgot one. Willemstad. It is capitol of Curaçao a former Dutch Colony. But too be honest I don't know which William it is named after. If I had the guess it's either William the Silent or William the 3rd.

Poland’s capital city Warsaw comes from legendary figuers of Wars and Sawa, more plausible etymology though points at certain Warsz, a former owner of the locality

Kazakhstan's current capital city, Astana, was previously called Nur Sultan, which was named after the former leader Nursultan Nazarbayev. This could have featured on the list too

Following these rules I believe Philipsburg on Sint Maarten was been forgotten. Sint Maarten is part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, however, it is a Sovereign state and I believe that would qualify them as "defiantly a country".

Interestingly enough Maputo used to be called Lourenço Marques, who also was a person

I'd argue that Nassau is not named after a person but after a city in honor of a person.

Johannesburg was most definitely named after someone but it’s not clear which person it is

where does your accent come from? below = belowa, thank you = thank youwa, patreon = patreona ?

William III who Nassau and Kingston where named after was mostly the King of the Netherlands and co-monarch of England (Britain)

Next video: Airports named after people I'm telling you, there's a lot.

what's the music used at the start of the video?

You mentioned Athens and Rome but forgot Paris? TSK TSK. He is just as real or mythological as Romulus and/or Athena

the case of Douglas is not _coincidence_ as much as both the city name and person name stemming from the same expression

If you did every non capital city too, there would be like 30 just named after LaFayette in the USA

I wonder how many were at some point named after a person. As many cities have changed names after a change of policy or falling to another civilization

Bucur(Bucharest) was a shepard. His church still stands to today. You'll find it at Piata Unirii.

Bishkek's Soviet era name was Frunze, a Soviet general originally born there.

I heard London came from Old English for fortress on a hill.

Its only a provincial capital but Darwin in the Northern Territory is named after Charles Darwin

Canada's capital Ottawa, was originally called Bytown after Colonel John By.

You could add Paris to the list of cities sounding like a person from legends / mythology, but isn’t.

There are also countries named after people. The United States of America is indirectly named after Amerigo Vespucci, Colombia is named after Columbus, Bolivia is named after Simón Bolivar, Saudi Arabia is named after the royal house of Saud and the official name for Greece is the Hellenic Republic which is named after Helen of Troy. Also, the entire planet Neptune was initially proposed to be named after king George III. When Neptune was discovered by the astronomer William Herschel he proposed it should be named Georgium Sidus (Georgian planet), but it obviously didn't catch on.

Why do Romulus for Rome and Athena for Athens count as people but Éiru for Ireland (Éire) doesn’t count?

legend says that Warsaw comes from the fisherman Vars and mermaid Sava

You missed Sri Jayewardenepura, the capital of Sri Lanka, which was named after its former president.

I thought Arthur Wellesley was a different person than Lord Wellington. Therefore I thought that Wellington, New Zealand was named after the same fellow who the beef and the boots are named after, Lord Wellington.

Asunción, Paraguay is named after the Virgin Mary’s Assumption the patroness of the city

Ho Chi Minh is named after the general who fought for Vietnamese Independence

Does that 15% take into account cities named after natural landmarks that are named after people? There has to be some of those right?

The de facto capital of Bolivia is actually La Paz, it’s where the president’s office is.

But it cannot be applied to a death monarch like the queen Elizabeth, basically means the "abdicated" one

shri lanka - colombo - name after colombs

The capital city of Ecuador is formally known as San Francisco de Quito, named after Francis of Assisi

Doesn't bother me in the least, but the sweet, sweet algorithm doesn't care so long as I make random type-y noises

Is the capital of St. Vincent & the Grenadines, Kingstown, also named after a king? Also, the capital of Antigua & Barbuda St. John's is a person's name by itself. The same for São Tomé, the capital of São Tomé and Príncipe.

The republic of Congo Brazaville... Cool, someone named a city after my favourite website

A lot of capitol cities

You forgot Delhi!!!!!!! Delhi is the anglicised name for the Persian name for the city Dehli, which comes from the cities original name dilli. Dilli comes from Dhilika which is the name of the ancient settlement establishment by the king of kannauj called Raja Dhilu. So delhi is named after Raja Dhilu

Abuja in Nigeria was name after king of 19th century of the same modern Abuja region Abu Jatua which was later relocated to suleja in the name of his grandson

Is Wellington (NZ) from the Duke of Wellington ?

Incorrect Information: Ulaanbaatar acutely means “Red Hero” and is not not for a specific person. It is not named after Sukhbaatar. There is already a province and city named after him but the capital is not name for him. This is very large mistake to make .

Yaaaaa Costa Rica mentioned 🇨🇷🇨🇷🇨🇷

* Sad Alexandria noises *

ThankYou4Sharing!!! ❤ 🕊 VeryIntrigueing!!! ❤ Weirdnames 4Sharing!!! ❤MuchLove!!!

Better do the colonies and the capitals that are not named after people as well in due course

You forgot the capital of Paraguay, Asunción. Its full name is "Nuestra Señora de la Asunción", which translates to "Our Lady of the Asumption", you know, the Virgin Mary.

Now countries named after people

I thought Pretoria is named after the King Protea flower.

As a bahamian, that pronunciation of my capital was horrendous, its pronunciation is (Na -Saw)

Washington DC is actually named after two people. You mentioned George Washington, but the DC stands for District of Columbia, Columbia as in Columbus. I'm sure you know this, but I thought it would have been pertinent to point out.

Please, please...!!! The Italian pronunciation of Savorgnan di (de) Brazzà is with GN pronounced like a (double) Spanish ñ (ññ), and the two ZZ pronounced [ddz], and the final accented "à" bearing the stress of the word. Little differences in the venitian regional dialect of the explorer, but not so much significant (mainly, the two ZZ becoming [z]).

I was expecting Nur Sultan from Kazakhstan. As they changed the name of Astana in 2019. However, it appears last September they changed it back after Nursultan Nazarbayev (Kazakhstan's president who served from 1991) resigned from office amid controversy.

The name of Pretoria has been changed to Tshwane, I think you forgot to mention that. also laughed every time at "'British Ties"'' aka Heavy colonialism, dispossession and maybe Genocide.

How about countries named after people if any

Surprised you didn't mention that the DC in Washington, DC stands for District of Columbia, with "Columbia" coming from Christopher Columbus.

hold up, so Sofia, bulgaria is not named after a person?

London was named after Lonnie Donegan.

being from Nassau county the way you said Nassau is no

When i saw the title of the video i immediately thought about Washington. When you told about 33 countries that have capitals named after a person i was shocked, but thought it's probably because of pacific nations. Only 2 minutes later i remembered about my own country, Ukraine...

"it's just a coincidence that it sounds exactly like the name of Douglas" no. the name "Douglas" arose as a Celtic toponymic surname, which Douglas, Isle of Man might be one of its origins.