• greenfire
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    1 day ago

    Hey, what’s the English word for California??

    • FackCurs@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      Technically, Caliphate. Calafia was the queen of the made up kingdom of California in a 16th century novel. The name comes from there.

      The name of Calafia was likely formed from the Arabic word khalifa (religious state leader) that is known as caliph in English and califa in Spanish.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calafia?wprov=sfti1

      • tetris11@lemmy.ml
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        1 day ago

        That’s the dumbest and most beautiful premise for naming a place that I’ve seen

      • voodooattack@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        And Khalifa (خليفة) in the Arabic language literally means successor/inheritor (aside from the religious connotations), so there is some trivia for the day.