Etymology
Mauritius was first named Dina Arobi by Arab sailors during the Middle Ages who were also the first people to visit the island. In 1507 Portuguese sailors visited the uninhabited island. The island appears with a Portuguese name Cirne on early Portuguese maps, probably because of the presence of the flightless bird, the dodo which was abundant at that time. Another Portuguese sailor, Dom Pedro Mascarenhas, gave the name Mascarenes to the Archipelago. In 1598 a Dutch squadron under Admiral Wybrand Van Warwyck landed at Grand Port and named the island Mauritius, in honour of Prince Maurits van Nassau, stadhouder of the Dutch Republic. Later the island became a French colony and was renamed Isle de France . On 3 December 1810 the French formally surrendered after the Napoleonic wars. Under British rule, the island's name reverted to Mauritius i/məˈrɪʃəs/. Mauritius is also commonly known as Maurice and Île Maurice in French, Moris in creole and मॉरिशस in Hindi.
Read more about this topic: Government Of Mauritius
Famous quotes containing the word etymology:
“The universal principle of etymology in all languages: words are carried over from bodies and from the properties of bodies to express the things of the mind and spirit. The order of ideas must follow the order of things.”
—Giambattista Vico (1688–1744)
“Semantically, taste is rich and confusing, its etymology as odd and interesting as that of “style.” But while style—deriving from the stylus or pointed rod which Roman scribes used to make marks on wax tablets—suggests activity, taste is more passive.... Etymologically, the word we use derives from the Old French, meaning touch or feel, a sense that is preserved in the current Italian word for a keyboard, tastiera.”
—Stephen Bayley, British historian, art critic. “Taste: The Story of an Idea,” Taste: The Secret Meaning of Things, Random House (1991)