A while ago I proposed etymologic cartography as a field of study. Somewhat related, I found this map that doesn’t show the etymology of placenames but literal translations of country names into English from Chinese:
Note: I have no way of checking the correctness of the place names in this map (and some do sound a bit ungrammatical), so take them with a pinch of salt.
Source: mapsontheweb.tumblr.com
Correct or not, many are hilarious. Thanks for sharing it.
True that, se non è vero, e ben trovato (if it’s not true, it’s at least well made up).
A big funny. I’m born in China, so I know, most translations in this picture are correct.
btw, if we literally translated Russia’s, Sweden’s and Moldova’s name from classic chinese into english, they will be “presently snare this”, “auspicious classics” and “strokes your many tilewares”.