List of Etymologies of Country Subdivision Names - Russia

Russia

  • Amur River: Amur comes from the Tungus amor for "great or big river".
  • Arkhangelsk Oblast: the region of the city of Arkhangelsk, whose name the inhabitants traditionally associated with a monastery in the area dedicated to the Archangel Michael (Russian: Архангел Михаил or Arkhangel Mikhail).
  • Chechnya: the Russian ethnonym Chechen probably derives from the name of the ancient village of Chechana or Chechen-aul. The village stands on the bank of the Argun River, near Grozny. Another theory derives the name from chechenit' sya, "to talk mincingly". Vasmer suggests a Kabardian origin: šešen. The native term, Noxçi, comes from nexça (sheep cheese), nox (plow) or from the prophet Noah (Nox in Chechen).
  • Dagestan: the word Daghestan or Daghistan (Avar: Дагъистан; Arabic and Persian: داغستان‎) means "country of mountains"; it derives from the Turkic word dağ, meaning "mountain" and the Persian suffix -stan meaning "land of". The spelling Dagestan transliterates the Russian name, which lacks the voiced velar fricative.
  • Grozny or Groznyy: Russian for "stern" or "severe" (as the adjective describing a fort)
  • Kaliningrad Oblast: from the Russian name Kaliningrad (Kalinin-city) of its largest city, renamed in 1946 to commemnorate Mikhail Kalinin
  • Kazan (former Imperial Russian governorate): (compare the name of the city of Kazan)
  • Khabarovsk Krai: the Khabarovsk region. The city of Khabarovsk took its name from the explorer Yerofey Khabarov
  • Leningrad Oblast: from the city (Saint Petersburg formerly known as Leningrad (Russian for Lenin-city)
  • Nizhniy Novgorod: Russian: literally "lower Novgorod": for "lower new city", "new city on the Lower Volga"; in contrast to the older Novgorod
  • Novaya Zemlya: Russian for "new land"
  • Novgorod: from Russian roots meaning "new city"
  • Novosibirsk: roughly means "new Siberian city"
  • Sakhalin: derived from misinterpretation of a Manchu name "sahaliyan ula angga hada" (peak of the mouth of the Amur River). "Sahaliyan" means "black" in Manchu and refers to the Amur River (sahaliyan ula).
  • Siberia: from a Tatar word meaning "sleeping land"
  • Smolensk: from the river Smolnya
  • Vladikavkaz: Russian for "ruler of the Caucasus" or "rule the Caucasus"
  • Vladivostok: Russian for "ruler of the East" or "rule the East"
  • Volgograd: Russian for "city of the Volga" or "Volga city"

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