Breaking News: America named after Drifterwood's great-great-great Grandfather!

[ManlyBanisters]

Actually this isn't breaking news at all - but I saw it on an episode of QI last night and thought it was kinda interesting.

I was taught in school that the name 'America' derived from the name of the Italian explorer and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci but apparently this is not necessarily the case at all.

It appears that Welshman Richard Ameryke (Richard ap Meryke), a financial backer of the Italian navigator John Cabot (Giovanni Caboto), is a more likely candidate for the origins of the name.

According to this info provided by Robert R Roberts to the St Pete's New World Celts chapter, not the Italian merchant and cartographer Amerigo Vespucci, but Richard Ameryk, a Welshman and wealthy Bristol merchant.
Ameryk was the chief investor in the 2nd transatlantic voyage of John Cabot - the English name of the Italian navigator Giovanni Caboto whose voyages in 1497 and 1498 laid the groundwork for for the later British claim to Canada. He moved to London from Genoa in 1484 and was authorized by King Henry VII to search for unknown lands to the West.
On his little ship Matthew, Cabot reached Labrador in May 1497 and became the 1st recorded European to set foot on North American soil, pre-dating Vespucci by 2 years. Cabot mapped the N. American coastline from Nova Scotia to Newfoundland. As the chief patron of the voyage, Richard Ameryk would have expected discoveries to be named after him. There is a record in the Bristol calendar for that year "...on St John the Baptist's Day [24 June], the land of America was found by the merchants of Bristowe, in a ship of Bristowe called the Mathew" that clearly suggests this is what happened.
Although the original calendar manuscript has not survived, there are numerous references to it in other contemporary documents. This is the first use of the term "America" to refer to the new continent.

http://www.celticatlanta.com/realms/wales/americanamedforwelshman.htm
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It is greatly thought by many historians these days that the actual name for AMERICA came from the name ap Meryk/AMERYKE from the information that came with Richard AMERYKE/Richard ap Meryke and calling the new land AMERYKE/AMERIKE County or something like that.

http://archiver.rootsweb.ancestry.com/th/read/MYRICK/2001-10/1003330987
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[deleted136887]

Well that is definitively something I never knew. Just allways accepted the standard history texts.
Thanks, Manly.

 

[Drifterwood]

Ap Merydd. Son of the sluggard. But the boy done well. Are there any back rents payable?

You could go for Vespucciland or Colonland :wink:, if you don't like the Welsh Connection.

 

[vince]

Cool. What I want to know is- was grandpa hot like Drifter?? :tongue:

 

[kalipygian]

Didn't St. Brendan name it after his little round curragh?

 

[Northland]

No, no, no! You are all wrong.


Amiri of Iraq is actually the person for whom America was named.

It seems that Amiri of Iraq was mispronounced by some drunken peacepipers back in the very olden days and they began to pronounce his name as Amiriraq. One blustery winter night, with lips half frozen, it became mispronounced as Ameriq. Now, seeing as how the soon to be plunderers of the new land did not like the letter Q, they took the sound of a hard C and made it Americ. Then, realizing that all land should be named after a woman, they feminized it with the letter A at the end, thus making it America. So, you see, it was MY great great great great grandfather's grandfather for whom America was named.



(I don't know why AmeriQ history books don't tell this tale)

 

[Gl3nn]

QI is great. You learn so many interesting things and it's funny

 

[lucky8]

Lol who would name their child Robert R Roberts?

 

[D_alex8]

No, no, no! You are all wrong.

Amiri of Iraq is actually the person for whom America was named.

When I was growing up in Egypt, one of my teachers at school gave a lengthy talk on how the works of Shakespeare were in fact translations of Arabic plays by one Sheikh Zabir, whose name had merely been corrupted into 'Shakespeare'.

To a bunch of pre-teens, it was moderately convincing, especially as the same teacher's other recent tale (about the disease Bilharzia having been named after a European doctor called William Hart - not the silent cowboy star - had turned out to contain at least a germ[an] of truth, albeit in a heavily distorted, ass-about-tit kinda way).

 

[Mr. Snakey]

Very interesting. Further information can be found by simply doing a google search on Bobberbasting.

 

[Drifterwood]

He was a real historic figure and he did sponsor the orginal journeys. His coat of arms can be found in a Bristol church. A golden star on blue and red stripes. I kid you not.

However, as we all know, America is really named after the Queen of Alpha Sentori VI.