Languagehat on "America":
I presume we all know about the first appearance
of the word America on the
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waldseem%C3%BCller_map>Waldseemüller
map of 1507; what I, at any rate, didn't know was
that the text of the map and accompanying
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cosmographiae_Introductio>book,
and hence the coining of the word, is thought to
be the work of Waldseemüller's friend
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthias_Ringmann>Matthias
Ringmann. [...] I offer
"<http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/ideas/articles/2010/07/04/where_america_really_came_from/>How
America got its name: The suprising story of an
obscure scholar, an adventurers letter, and a
pun," a lively Boston Globe piece by Toby Lester. A sample:
The author, for example, demonstrates a
familiarity with ancient Greek, a language that
Ringmann knew well and that Waldseemüller did
not. He also incorporates snatches of classical
verse, a literary tic of Ringmanns. The one
contemporary poet quoted in the text, too, is
known to have been a friend of Ringmann.
Waldseemüller the cartographer, Ringmann the
writer: This division of duties makes sense,
given the two mens areas of expertise. And,
indeed, they would team up in precisely this way
in 1511, when Waldseemüller printed a new map of
Europe. In dedicating that map, Waldseemüller
noted that it came accompanied by "an explanatory
summary prepared by Ringmann."
This question of authorship is important because
whoever wrote "Introduction to Cosmography"
almost certainly coined the name America. Here
again, I would suggest, the balance tilts in the
favor of Ringmann, who regularly entertained
himself by making up words, punning in different
languages, and investing his writing with hidden
meanings. In one 1511 essay, he even mused
specifically about the naming of continents after women.
<http://www.languagehat.com/archives/003917.php>Link
