Why is greece hellas

At least in English. I don't know about the other languages. Sign up to join this community. The best answers are voted up and rise to the top.

Stack Overflow for Teams — Collaborate and share knowledge with a private group. Create a free Team What is Teams? Learn more. Why is Greece not called in English by the name Hellas? Asked 6 years, 9 months ago. Active 6 years, 9 months ago. Viewed 16k times. Improve this question. WS2 WS2 From this statement of Aristotle it is asserted that the name of Graeci was at one period widely spread in Epirus and the western coast of Greece in general, hence it became the one by which the Hellenes were known to the Italic peoples on the opposite side of the Ionian Sea.

It's seems only Norway has opted for a Hellenic rather than a Greek name, so to speak. Also note that in Norwegian, the adjective derived from Hellas is still gresk , and a person from Greece can be called either greker or hellener ; so the switch is only half-hearted, as it were. I said Sweden, I should have mentioned Finland of course Suomi vs Finland. You think "Greece" is incorrect?

At least it's based on historical fact. And so, to these heathens, to anyone who did not speak Greek, they gave the name barbarians, because they were just so, well, just so barbaric! And that is where we get the word barbarian, originally meaning anyone who did not speak Greek! The first Greek — speakers were the Mycenaean Greeks, who originated way back in the Neolithic 15, BC — and BC or Bronze Age — BC and Greek was, of course, spoken in the Greek colonies which sprung up along the shores of the Mediterranean and Black Sea but which mainly centered on the coast of the Aegean and Ionian seas.

Mother of Pyrrha. Deucalion, ruler of Phthia, an ancient city of Thessaly, central Greece, was warned by his father, Prometheus, that the big rains were coming, and advised him to be prepared; build a wooden chest Ark?

Deucalion and Pyrrha riding out the Greek Deluge and hoping for the best. Sure enough, the heavens opened, Deucalion and his wife, Pyrrha, took refuge in the chest he had put together and proceeded to be thrown around in turbulent seas for the following nine days and nights, before finally running aground on the highest peak of Mount Parnassus, which overlooks Delphi in central Greece.

Other variations on this story have the couple running aground on Mount Othrys, Thessaly, or Phouka, Argolis, today named Nemea. So relieved to be back on terra firma, Deucalion and Pyrrha, would agree to anything asked of them and so complied, when ordered by Zeus King of the Greek gods , to throw stones over their shoulders, which instantly became people, the stones thrown by Deucalion became men, and the ones thrown by Pyrrha, women, who went on to repopulate Greece.

Hellen eventually had many children himself, including Aeolus, leader of the tribe of Aeolians, Dorus, leader of the tribe of Dorians, Xuthus, leader of the tribe of Achaens and Ion, leader of the tribe of Ionians. Zacharia says that there is no correct answer to the origin of the names Greece and Hellas — however their first appearances can be traced. The word Hellene was mentioned for the first time by Homer in the Iliad as a territory near the Esperqueo river, which is still known by that name.

It is also used to referr to the companions of Achilles from this place — a relatively small, but vigorous group of people. On the other hand, the name Grecos comes from a son of Pandora and Zeus, from whom the Greeks are named. The Hellenic tribe of the Greeks, or Graecians, took its name, according to legend, from Greco.

They were one of the first tribes to colonize Italy, in the area known as Magna Graecia, which used this name for them in antiquity.