Japan's Weirdly Out Of Place Region Name 

Love u Name Explain #NameExplain

I’ve only been to kanto and hoenn

Yes

@@zaidenallen9933 It's pretty easy to get to Johto from Kanto. You should visit next time you're in the area.

None.

you again...

how's it going in the north mate?

I see a fellow Kento Bento fan here

Hey!! You are alive Kim. Please do some stunt I am bored with this CONVID-19 news 🤣🤣

Its Shiratori

That's really interesting, thanks for sharing! (sorry if that sounded sarcastic lol)

@@NameExplain oh it's all good

They use Townships in New Jersey and Counties in New York, where in NYC, they can either be counties or boroughs. The caveat here is to use either term and not to mix between county & borough when speaking, etc... For more look up The names of New York City or check this link before visiting New York City: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-VXle30cHGkk.html

Alaska has boroughs if I’m nit mistaken

While the names do vary, the vast majority of states use Counties, and everything else is called “County-equivalent”.

Rempuuken!

Except that the name would get censored

Sounds like what players plan to do at the end of their dates to me!

Might be the -ken suffix

To do fucking

What is the difference in terms of powers between those four?

Pedro Figueira Almost the same. Ken(県) is the most common. １.Fu(府) were used for Tokyo, Osaka and Kyoto because they're the most important cities in Japan. Also Tokyo was Tokyo-fu(1868-1943). To(都) means capital. ２.Kyoto-fu and Osaka-fu are more important than Ken. ３.Do(道) is a short form for Hokkaido however it's same as name of regions now. I'm sorry if I'm wrong and my bad explain in English

@@harbours2774 What's difficult about it? I lived there for 20 years, and have been to ALL 47 of them.

Sunglass Shinpan I think foreigners can understand about the system but They can't understand the differences between TO, DO, FU and KEN easily. Because it comes from the Japanese history. Are you a foreigner in Japan?

@@harbours2774 so from that, does the name for "Kyoto" come from it being the capital of a place called Kyo? I never noticed before but Tokyo and Kyoto look like the same word but with the order of To and Kyo switched.

yes, it's Länder (lands) or Bundesländer (federal lands), Staaten is mostly used for nation states. and saying "dieser Staat" (this state) in germany basically always refers to all of germany. the US subdivisions are also called Staaten (states) or more commonly Bundesstaaten (federal states). "states" is only used when referring to the german lands in english. and i think it sounds fairly odd, like an american not knowing the names for subdivisions aren't universal 😅.

Staat in german does not always perfectly translate to state as used in English, the way I understand it at least.

Man, I remember having to learn all 16 Bundesländer in school... everybody bitched, but it's come in strangely handy, für mich

@@tequilyps i still think it was pretty useless. :P

sofias. orange lol you guys only had 16 to learn about. I’m in the US so I have to learn about 50.

Verdade, nós em Portugal já não usamos esse termo!

O vídeo explica ao minuto 8:43 que foram os portugueses que levaram essa palavra (e muitas outras) :)

Weirdly enough, that's not the name of the administrative division itself, which is called "municipality" (município), only the executive branch of a municipality is called "prefecture" (prefeitura). They're often mixed up.

como se divide em portugal? pensava ser prefeitura também.

@@busnello1987 Câmara Municipal!

But it does sound very Russian. Unlike "Estado" in the Estados Unidos Mexicanos.

@@jamescook2412 I mean, I agree “Estado” does not sound very Russian at all. But seriously, “Estado” comes to Spanish through Latin, while English borrowed the term through French. So “estado” definitely looks and sounds very Spanish.

Yep, nothing special. Russian Federation has a ton of types of subjects, including republics, krais (lands), autonomous oblasts and okrugs (vicinities), and in past Russian Empire and early USSR had such a thing as gubernia (governorate). Poland also retains a unique name for administrative subject once used in Eastern Europe, wojewodztwo (warlordship) or, Anglicised, voivodeship.

@@jamescook2412 What? Estado is a totally common Spanish word. It is certainly more native to us than "State" is to Germanic languages like English.

@@user-qd8yy9lc4g woah, did Poland still has administrative region with title like warlordship/voivodeship nowadays? I've never heard that title outside of medieval-themed games or stories

Most people I know still use shire. My shire, Ayrshire, has been split into 3 councils.

@@grdn2607 Ha, funny enough, I too come from Ayrshire. :)

Samuel James Kennedy as much as everyone here love to hate ayrshire it's honestly one of the most beautiful places in the lowlands

​@@grdn2607 Oh I completely agree, Ayrshire is stunning, it is filled with such rich history, so many beautiful castles (Like Eglinton, Culzean, Craufurdland, Dean, Cassillis and Rowallan just to name a few) countless gorgeous beaches, and more inland around East Ayrshire, you have Loch Doon, Loudoun Hill, Dumfries House (ignoring whether or not, either of us supports the English/British Royals owning property in Scotland, it still is such a beautiful estate). It's just such a shame what Thatcher did to our bonnie shire, as well as the councils not giving too much attention towards the towns. Look at Ayr, how much of a bustling seaside resort it used to be, or how Kilmarnock was an industrial powerhouse; Making the carpets for Titanic, Johnnie Walkers' Whisky, The train service depot, and now Kilmarnock has nothing but an ugly massive car-park and the most casual public drug-dealing you'll ever see at the bus station. I do hope that one day, Ayrshire could return to some kind of glory, but I doubt that'll ever happen now. So sad!

Samuel James Kennedy I’m very pro independence but after reading that I want Indy for Ayrshire 😂 the economy will be fast food and heroin

But those doesn’t hold any administrative power. Its the ”Län” that Holds regional power. Län means county

@@noxtrin1878 Yes Län is an even better example!

Shh, don't mention the landsdelar, landskap, län and regioner (landsting?).

You again

No

@@instantinople3796must live on RU-vid

why do i see everywhere I go

Bill wurtz reference *i see youre the man of culture as well*

Prior to the Meiji era, Japan was indeed split up into provinces, which had their own districts, and were arranged into regional circuits, all of which coexisted with the domain system of feudal lords.

Current France is also divided in "départements". It's probably their influence.

I think it's a south american thing, isn't that how colombia & venezuela are divided too?

@@jamescook2412 Colombia, yes. Venezuela, no. Venezuela is supposed to be a federal republic made of states, but it's very centralized as with most federations in Latin America, but even more so in the case of Venezuela.

Though we no longer have "departamentos", now they are just called "regions".

@@teresarivasugaz2313 True, but departments are below that.

Tokyo = East Capital Kyoton = Capital Metropolis Fukuoka = Happiness Hill Shizuoka = Silent Hill Hokkaido = North Sea Way Aomori = Grue Forest Nagasaki = Long Cape Nagano = Long Field Yamanashi = Mountain Pear

Ehime it is

@@HasekuraIsuna Tokio = East Capital, Beijing = North Capital, Seoul = Country's Capital?

@@jamescook2412 I don't know about Seoul as I don't read hangul, but yes 東京 Tokyo = East Capital 北京 Beijing = North Capital 南京 Nanjing = South Capital

@@FourOf92000 You got that right! And what a year I had when I lived there! 😍

Open the country. Stop having it be closed.

r/unexpectedbillwurtz

@@rockLuca14 England loved going around to countries and saying that

@@trunkage And planting their flag and claiming it as their own. After all, no flag = no country.

How interesting !

In the legal systems of those states, yes Commonwealth. But they are all states, their official names don't change anything. The Census Bureau (I think that's the right agency) uses county-equivalent for all boundaries set up by states, given that yes Alaska (burroughs) and Louisiana (parishes) don't have counties as their subdivisions.

@@sion8 Right? It's like "you can call yourself "Mr. Awesome" all you want, but we're going to keep calling you "Steve" as that's your real name."

Kind of explains why there's Virginia Commonwealth University, because Virginia is technically a commonwealth by name.

@@geronimowindow Indeed. People from the states that call themselves officially "Commonwealth of…" defend that usage hard! So yeah, commonwealth everywhere!

@@geronimowindow Go Rams!

It must be a slavic word then

Most likely but it's weird to think the russian ones don't get translated while the bulgarian do

@@trojan-not it’s probably because while in Bulgarian, oblast means “province”, in Russian, it just means “area”.

@@galaxypedestalfan not the case. oblast can be used as "area" in bulgarian too. I'd even assume that's how we use it for 'province' names, because I have never percieved the word oblast as having a double meaning.

Would be some weird mixture of dialects...

Racist colonial English people: we, the superior Anglo-Saxon race!

Shires are also used in Australia, but in a different manner. In Britain they use it as a suffix but in Australia is done in the format "Shire of…"

Yes! Derpartment of Cundinamarca (Colombia) represent!

Shire isn't something used all over the "british" Isles It is an old English word that has also spread to Wales and Scotland

I am Swiss and I really want to know the origin of Canton/Kanton.

Headline in a newspaper just before war with Argentina in the 1980s: British Left Waffles On Falklands (Allegedly)

The USA's version of state is historical in the sense that it started as a confederation of separate countries that then later formed a joint federal government over the top while still maintaining a lot of power in the states. The USA was not much different than the EU in the first few years of independence. If the EU had a stronger federal government, one might consider Germany as a state within the EU in the same sense as an American would consider New York.

@@andrewhawkins6754 Right, but Germany was formalized in its new Republic as a Federal state parallel to the at-the-time USA. So, skip the whole independent nations in a confederation, and skip straight to dual-layer sovereignty.

David Freeman actually prefectures in China is the same as FU in Japan and major cities are called FU just like Osaka and Kyoto

@@tohkenghoe That's sort of too much of a simplification. I'd call it mainly a translation problem

David Freeman it is likely the same cos it was legacy of the Tang dynasty which is where the Japanese took most of the stuff from. Even the days of the week is from the Tang dynasty

What am I like?

Subcribe?

Or the Portuguese influence either. But it’s super common for people to just assume the Sakoku policies meant that the Japanese totally isolated, rather than simply withdrew and strictly limited contact. I mean, he also said that at the end of the Shogunate, Japan “came back under the rule of an Emperor”, while the Emperor had all that time been nominally in charge of the country already. The governments of Japan are always a super tricky thing to cover, because every one of their revolutions has basically always been to restore the Emperor to his rightful place in charge of the people… even the original Tokugawa Shogunate. Technically, the Shogun still served at the pleasure of the Emperor, even though de facto the Shogun ran everything. But I’m preaching to the choir here, aren’t I?

@@puellanivis Yes, I agree, but the Portuguese influence is much smaller because of the time period of trading, for Portugal (1609-1649) and for the Dutch (1609-1859). Many of the earlier words that people nowadays assume were from English actually came from Dutch. Like the word kōhī コ ー ヒ ー for Coffee and Kokku for Kok in Dutch. And the word for electricity and telescope. Nowadays you see so many videos on the internet with titles like "10 surprising words in Japanese that came from English". Or something else. While in fact many of those words are Dutch of dirived trough Dutch. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_Japanese_words_of_Dutch_origin There was even a subject taught, Rangkaku (Dutch studies) that helped to study the West. It was a huge study of the elite and had a high standard in Japan. The Dutch introduced increasing painting techniques and telescopes etc. And other scientific outbreaks from the west. Some historians even believe that, without the Dutch influence (and a little Portuguese too), the Mejji restoration could never actually have been done so 'easily'. The Japanese learned new knowledge and techniques from the Netherlands and Europe through Dutch books. This ultimately helped Japan to modernize quickly I mean, they provided them with about 250+ years of information, brought to Japan only by them. The only countries that could influance in any way were China and I believe India. But they are not Western. A number of terms have been adopted from Dutch into the Japanese language. At one point, it is thought that about 3,000 words have been used, especially in the areas of technical and scientific vocabulary. In standard Japanese, about 160 such words of Dutch origin remain in use to date. But note, that is only in standard Japanese. But I agree with you. These were just more examples. It was only a assumption of the maker of this channel, wich many people assume to. It doesn't really matter. I like his channel a lot! Thankyou for your comment. If I reacted quite lately than that is because of the time zones I assume.

@@axolotl-guy9801 Which Japanese word for electricity is from Dutch, the only one I know of is 電気. And telescope, is there something except 望遠鏡?

@@HasekuraIsuna erekishiteito - エ レ キ シ テ イ ト. It may not be used that commen. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_Japanese_words_of_Dutch_origin And telscoop is: Teresukoppu テ レ ス コ ッ プ Howerever, apparently that one is not used any more and it is become: taionkei ( 体温計 ). But note that it was the only word back in the days in the Edo period. My Japananese language skills are not that great, but I am learning it. I can not (jet) read Kanji. Just remember that some of the words you use has only been used "recently". Some Dutch words have been used for some 250+ years. And then some were replaced by other words. Others are still used. あい

@@axolotl-guy9801 I think those two are rather than "uncommon" are "extinct" by now lol. And I think you copy pasted wrong, because 体温計 (literally body-warmth-measure) is thermometer. I took a look at the list, seems like a lot of the scientific words got in from Dutch and stays around today! Good luck in your Japanese studies, it is a wonderful language! Don't let the many kanji frighten you, they may be many but they all tell a story. If you need any help feel free to ask, I'm a kanji-nerd. (｀・ω・´)

Only in the rural areas, there are no 郡 in Tokyo afaik.

@@HasekuraIsuna Not true. Tokyo has one gun Nishitama-Gun （西多摩郡）. All towns and villages (町,and 村）not within a 市 will always be under a 郡。

@@wesleynishi6081 I had no idea! I've been living in Tokyo for six years and in my work I regurarly check the addresses of customers from all over the country and never came across 郡 in non-rural areas. Hat off sir, I stand corrected.

@@wesleynishi6081 What about 区 ? I've seen this kanji in my textbook, and it was translated as a "ward" in Tokyo.

@@peepingtom9342 区is a special city district. They have their own government/council that oversees the area. They are generally only found in larger cities such as Tokyo, Osaka, Fukuoka, but not in smaller cities like Tokushima, Toyama, Miyazaki etc. In these smaller cities, you will often have 町or towns. They are not separate towns nor do they have any council/government oversight. The 区designation applies to cities requiring local government oversight.

I wonder if Gmina is a loanword from German, Gemeinde. Sounds too similar to be a coincidence.

@@hamsterama it is indeed. Apparently it has been in use in Polish language since before medieval times. Voivodeship and powiat are slavic on the other hand. First is derived from word 'wojewoda' which is combination of words 'warrior' and 'to lead' - those people would lead the army if the royal couldn't. Powiat is derived from word 'wiec' which means gathering (although that's not really in use anymore - nowadays it means "witch sabbath") - it was a division for early judicial system as there were no specific buildings for courts.

If you don't have a local identity then the Voivodeship is enough for you, my Poviat is very ethnically unique so I wouldn't say that "nobody truly cares", and voivodships are controlled by the government, poviats are self-governing. There are also Stolectvo (community) - consisting of one or several villages in the gmina.

@@10hawell When I say "nobody truly cares" it just me. I am from Pomorskie (Pomerania). I don't know much about Powiats or Gminas. I currently live in Scotland, UK. Sorry if you care about your Powiat but I don't.

@@katarzynasoyka8538 Very interesting info, thank you! And thanks for explaining the history of the names of Polish government units. I'm American, and I'm of Polish ancestry. I always like to learn something new about the land of my ancestors. I visited the city of Szczecin almost 15 years, by taking a train via Germany. I'd like to visit Poland again sometime soon!

Isn't it a bit weird how Germany has 3 Saxonies?

@@japanpanda2179 It's pretty easy. There's original Saxony, proper Saxony and Germany's Alabama.

@@thelinuxcolonel Makes sense. Which is which? Is Leipzig Saxony the Alabama one?

@@japanpanda2179 No! The Leipzig one (Sachsen) is proper Saxony (and the best Saxony imo). The Hannover one (Niedersachsen) is original Saxony, because that's where the tribe of the Saxons came from. And the Halle one (Sachsen-Anhalt) is Germany's Alabama, though I'd understand if people would see that as an insult to Alabama.

@@thelinuxcolonel Isn't Sachsen the one that votes for the AfD a lot though?

Etymology doesn't do much, usage is what really matters but etymology can be used as a factor in usage.

8:43 claro, pois foram os portugueses também a levar essa palavra (e muitas outras) para o Japão :)

True, but the usual translation into English has been "state". Although, even some of those German "states" have their own unique names for themselves, which four U.S. states similarly done by officially calling themselves "Commonwealth of…".

@@sion8 I think the translation into 'states' just indicates their political system. As you know the current German system (literally called the Federal Republic) models highly after the American system, especially in certain areas such as making their capital a separate 'state' (or 'state equivalent' at least). However the idea of 'lands' also existed in traditional German political system dating back to HRE I think. At least before the Nazis took power (and even nominally after they're in power) Germany was sort of a 'confederation'. After the unification of the German Empire, literally kingdoms, principalities and grand duchies existed, with those local monarchies still holding onto its title. Just giving the 'states' a high degree of autonomy isn't really 'foreign' to Germany, hence there's a chance to use a more 'German' name for it.

@@davidfreeman3083 You're right that Germany is a true federation thus "state" is a specific term in English used for federated entities (in contrast to Canadian provinces, which are also federal states, but province is a term used for non-federal subjects in general). During the 1st & 2nd Confederation, the 2nd Empire and the 1st Republic the federal subjects were called "Bundesstaaten" because they had a head of state (either monarch or president) in the 2nd & 3rd Republic "Bundesländer" have no head of state only a prime minister who's the head of government but not head of state.

@@sualtam9509 What's the 1st republic? Or 2nd? 3rd?

@@davidfreeman3083 I was going to say that the HRE wasn't ever really a country and closer to a confederation, but even then it was its own entity. But given just how different those German states are in how they named themselves, it was easier to just go with states in English rather than called them "federal lands" or whatever.

Thank you. Hope you have a great 24 hours as well. And thank you for sharing positivity and inclusiveness. 🙂

I appreciate that he wasn’t a like hoarder asking to like him to have a nice day

24 hours, but no more.

Fun2 -- Thanks. I had a great 23 hours and 55 minutes plus 5 minutes of horror. You came darn close and I appreciate your effort.

wow only 24 hours

Fun fact: the time and circumstances of the founding of both Rome and Japan are largely legendary and mythical, and as such, are not documented factual events.

@Trace Fleeman Garcia Nooo! I enjoy it to much!

@Trace Fleeman Garcia That is literally the opposite of pedantry. That's historical fact, and the original comment was simply incorrect.

take my like good sir

@Takeo i know

@Takeo i just like being nice

No

No, u.

But Belgium is complicated you could make a video about Belgium.

Here in Spain we also use provinces

He wasn't doing 2nd-level subdivisions, just 1st-level.

It's not specific to English. The French call Deutschland, Allemagne.

Netherlands vs. Holland is a different thing since it's not exonym vs. endonym. Rather the country is Netherlands (Nederland) in both English and Dutch and Holland is a region inside the country comprising two provinces.

Honestly, its todofuken insanity

@Deva Rafael no

@Deva Rafael i'm sure that oblast(in polish okrąg) and kraj isn't equal to voivodeship. I think that kraj would be translated to country. Voivodeship is unique to Poland

@Deva Rafael It literally means "region/domain of voivode" as voivode during Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was a position that was basically a regional overseer (with very little actual power, it wasn't an aristocratic title) appointed by the king.

Oh boy, you said it. When I first visited Belgium I couldn't believe it. In my opinion Belgium is ready to dismember itself at any time. When you really look into it you begin to wonder how the hell it holds itself together. I suppose this explains why they are such big supporters of the European Union, although the way that project is going I don't see much future to it.

Don’t forget about Brussels-Capital Region (Brussels Hoofdstedelijk Gewest)

You'll always be remembered for your waffles

Then you have the Districts inside those that double as Towns & Cities.

?

Cornish is Brythonic Celtic, not Gaelic

@@TomorrowWeLive I know, the joke is that Scotland has a much bigger and plausible independence movement that Cornwall

@@aksb2482 Cornwall has a plausible independence movement they aren't English

Close, but no cigar! If we use "proper" spelling metropolis = to urban pref. = fu tofu = toufu You are missing a "u"

@@HasekuraIsuna What? To + Fu =/= ToUFu. And who translates the Japanese into "toufu" anyway? It's commonly spelled "tofu" (no extra u) in English. Alternative Romanizations, despite repeated efforts, are not a thing.

In japanese alphabet(kana), toufu is written with 3 letters like ;to u fu. In english, "to+u" sounds like single long vowel. Prefecture of "to" is short vowel, so it has totally different sound. There are two official spelling rules for japanese in latin alphabet. One way does not recognize long/short vowels so it is written like tofu in both case of long/short vowels. Another way does recognize them; long vowel is written like tōfu (this video uses this ō letter), short vowel is written like tofu. I personally prefer the latter way because it makea easier to understand japanese phonology.

@@your_opponent Easier understanding does sound appealing. However, English specifically, unlike other Latin alphabet languages, does not use accents over letters.

@@PongoXBongo OP made a "pun" _in Japanese_ so I only explained why that pun doesn't work. And it doesn't work in English because you don't use "to" and "fu" in English, you use "prefecture". But by all means, let's use words from both languages to make "puns", it'll be fun like a Chestnut-Vinegar-Trout party!

I agree. And for a channel that's about names I think he should take a bit more time on learning at least an approximation of the pronunciations. Even resorting to a quick Google Translate TTS doing its thing helps things a long way if one is not familiar with using IPA phonemes. Speaking as a multilingual person (mostly out of necessity. Not being elitist but just sharing an oft neglected perspective by monolingual Anglos.), I like the content and the new knowledge but its just one facet where it pulls the experience down.

was about to comment this

Indeed! This is something that has bothered me too for quite a while.

Well, it means "middle country," which is what it was before the Tokugawa regime consolidated power. Not a particularly creative name, but there you have it.

True but misleading. From Wikipedia: "Chūgoku literally means "middle country", but the origin of the name is unclear." ... "In Japanese, the characters 中国 and the reading Chūgoku began to be used to mean "China" after the founding of the Republic of China."

Where I live we have a place that was called China until the end of the industrial revolution when we changed it

I've been twice. One time I stayed in Tokyo and the second we travelled around to Kyoto & Takayama as well as visit Tokyo again. If you're into the more pop culture side of Japan (anime, games, manga ect) then staying in Tokyo will be perfect. The district of Akihabara is any weebs paradise. However if you like the more historical and traditional side of Japan then go further afield. Kyoto is one of the most beautiful cities I have ever seen and Takayama is surrounded by wonderful nature. Hope that helps!

Tokyo is THE WORST! Get out into the countryside if you want the REAL Japan!