Latinus Quizus

Answer: Aberdeen, Scotland

Aberbeen was first settled over 8,000 years ago and was originally separated between Old Aberdeen, at the mouth of the river Don, and New Aberdeen, by the river Dee estuary. The Celtic and Gaelic origins of its name both refer to the city being located by rivers, or at the mouth of two rivers.

The names Aberystwyth and Aberdare come from the name origin as Aberdeen, with "aber" meaning mouth (or a river).

Abbeydorney's Irish name is Mainistir Ó dTorna ("Monastery of the clan of Torna"), and its English name derives from its translation "O'Dorney Abbey", in reference to a Cistercian abbey was founded there by the chieftain O Torna.

Answer: Aix-en-Provence, France

Aix-en-Provence became a capital during the middle Ages, and the capital of the Provence until the French Revolution. Its university was founded in 1409 and Aix has remained a cultural hot spot. Painter Paul Cézanne was born there, and the city was frequented by Émile Zola, Ernest Hemingway, etc.

Bath was founded by the Romans and called Aquae Sulis (the main spring of the Roman baths was a shrine veneered by Iron Age Britons and dedicated to the goddess Sulis). It remained a spa town, and became quite popular during Victorian times. Today, the Roman Baths attract over 1 million visitors each year.

Aix-la-Chapelle, or Aachen in German, seems to have been named Aquis Granum by the Romans, in reference to the hot sulfur spring which was then used to create baths (Granus seems to have been a Celtic minor god). It never was a major town until Charlemagne decided to spend a winter there. Many German Kings were crowned in Aachen, until the city lost most of its power during the 16th century.

Avignon's name comes from the Occitan Avinhon. It was founded by a Gallic tribe and quickly became linked to the Greek colony of Massilia (Marseilles). Under the Romans, Avenio became a flourishing city. Avignon is often called "City of Popes" because of the presence of popes and anti-popes during the 14th and 15th century Catholic schism.

Answer: Cologne, Germany

Cologne was originally founded by a Germanic tribe called the Ubii and a few years later, the Romans founded their colony on the Rhine River. Very quickly, Colonia became an important city and it never stopped being one. Today, it is Germany's fourth-largest city.

Köniz dates back from Bronze Age and Iron Age settlements. Archaeological digs have also unearthed Roman villas and early Middle Ages graveyards, but the first mention of the town as such date back from the 11th century, where it was called Chunicis.

Innsbruck was called Oenipons by the Romans. "Oenus" is the Latin name of the Inn River, and "pons" simply means bridge. The name Innsbruck means the exact same thing, with "bruck" coming from the German "brücke", a bridge. During the 4th century, Romans established an army station in the city, as it was located on an economically important route linking Italy to Germany.

The first time the city of München is mentioned in writing is 1158, which has led people to believe it was founded around this time. Its name is a derivation from Old High German "Munichen", meaning "by the monks". Ecclesiastical Latin named the city Monachium, possibly a derivation of "monasterium", or a simple Latinized version of its German name.

Answer: Canterbury, England

Canterbury was fist settled by a Celtic tribe, the Cantiaci. During the 1st century CE, Romans conquered it and rebuilt the city. When the romans left England, it was inhabited by the Jutes, a Danish people originating from Jutland, in the Netherlands, and given the name Cantwaraburh, "Kent people's stronghold".

Settlements in the Charleroi region date back from Prehistoric times. Temples and villas were also later built by the Romans, but the first mention of the city dates back from the 9th century, where it was called Charnoy. In 1666, the city was officially founded by the Governor of the Netherlands, whose King was Charles II of Spain. It was given the name of Charles-Roy.

The area of Dover has been inhabited since the Stone Age, and by the Bronze Age, its influence was already strong. Under the Romans, it became a important military and commercial harbour, and one of the starting point of their Watling Street. It was given the name Portus Dubris ("a fortified port"). One of the best-preserved Roman villas in the U.K. is in Dover.

The city of Dordrecht was founded by the Thure River, and its name comes from the river and the word "drecht", which is Middle Dutch for "ford". Its name would therefore mean "Thure river crossing". The city was granted rights in 1220, which makes Dordrecht the oldest city of South Holland.

Answer: Saragossa, Spain

Saragossa's name comes from the Arabic "Saraqusta". Saragossa was first part of the Emirate of Cordoba, when Spanish was under Arab control. It became the biggest Muslim city of Northern Spain. The city remained Arab until the beginning of the 12th century, when the Aragonese conquered it and made the capital of the Kingdom of Aragon.

Carthage's history is about 3,000 years old. According to the story, it started as a Phoenician colony and developed into a major power in the Mediterranean region. Carthage was destroyed by the Romans in 146 BCE and it remained one of the most important Roman cities until it was destroyed again in 698 CE by Hasan ibn al-Nu'man's army. Today, Carthage is a residential area and a touristic attraction in the suburbs of Tunis.

Cartagena was created around 227 BCE during the Phoenician conquest of most of the Mediterranean shore. It was first named "Qart Hadasht" ("new city") which was also Carthage's name at the time, as it was an extension of Carthage's influence into Spain. Between 209 BCE and 714 CE, the city was conquered by the Romans, the Vandals, the Visigoths, the Byzantines and finally the Moors. In 1245, it became part of the Christian Kingdom of Castile.

Coimbra was called "Aeminium" by the Romans. It was captured by the Visigoths, who modified the Roman name and called the city "Eminio". When the Moors conquered most of Spain, they renamed the city Coimbra. The city was re-conquered by Ferdinand I of León in 1064, and it became the capital of Portugal, from 1131 until 1255. Its university, established in 1537, is one of the oldest in Europe.

Answer: Istanbul, Turkey

It seems that people have been living in the region of Istanbul since the Neolithic but the story of the city itself starts in 660 BCE, when King Byzas established Byzantion on the European side of the Bosphorus. Byzantium then became Constantinople and throughout history, it served as the capital of the Roman Empire and the Ottoman Empire. In 1930, Turkey formally requested for the city to be called Istanbul, a name which had been in used since the 10th century.

Carthage's history is about 3,000 years old. According to the story, it started as a Phoenician colony and developed into a major power in the Mediterranean region. Carthage was destroyed by the Romans in 146 BCE and it remained one of the most important Roman cities until it was destroyed again in 698 CE by Hasan ibn al-Nu'man's army. Today, Carthage is a residential area and a touristic attraction in the suburbs of Tunis.

Alexandria was founded by Alexander the Great around 330 BCE. The city was to remain the capital city of the region for almost 1,000 years. The city became officially Roman in 80 BCE, and this is where Julius Caesar met Cleopatra VII in 47 BCE. During the 7th century, Alexandria was conquered by Muslims and a new capital was founded at Fustat, which was later absorbed into Cairo. Today, Alexandria has over 4 million inhabitants.

Thessaloniki was founded in 315 BCE by Cassander of Macedon, whose wife, Thessalonike, was Alexander the Great's half-sister. It quickly became an important city of Macedonia. In 168 BCE, the city became a free city of the Roman Republic, under the name Thessalonica. Following the fall of Rome, it became the second city in the Byzantine Empire, after Constantinople. It remained a free city until it was captured by the Ottomans in 1430.

Answer: Copenhagen, Denmark

The story says that Copenhagen was founded in 1167, when Bishop Absalon had a small castle built on the island of Slotsholmen, but many historians agree that the town dated back to the late Viking age and was possibly founded by Sweyn I Forkbeard, King of Denmark and England. The city's name is a derivation of "Køpmannæhafn", meaning "merchants' harbour". The chemical element halfium, whose existence was predicted by Mendeleev, was discovered in 1923 by two scientists, in Copenhagen. The bacterium hafnia, which can affect the digestive track, was also identified in Copenhagen and named after the city's Latin name.

Stockholm was founded in the late 12th, early 13th century on a strategic site on the coast of Sweden. By 1252, it had become an important town thanks due nearby iron mines and it immediately became the de facto capital of the country. The origins of its name are unclear, but it probably means "logs on the islet" or "fortified islet" ("holm" means islet).

According to Ptolemy (1st and 2nd centuries CE), the first historic name of Hamburg was Treva. In 808 CE, Charlemagne had a castle built on this site, and the castle was name Hammaburg ("burg" means castle or fort in Old German). The castle was eventually destroyed and no one knows its exact location. In 1241, the alliance between Hamburg and Lübeck led to the creation of the Hanseatic League. In 1806, the city became a sovereign state with the official title "Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg", which remains its official name to this day. In Ecclesiastical Latin, Hamburg's name was Hammonia.

Helsinki was founded by Gustav I of Sweden in 1550 and given the name Helsingfors. His intentions were to create a town which would compete with Tallinn (then called Reval), which was part of the Hanseatic League and which dominated local trade. In 1640, the town was moved to another location but once again failed to develop economically. In 1809, Russia defeated Sweden and annexed Finland and moved the capital from Turku to Helsinki. The name Helsinki refers to the river and rapids surrounding the city.

Answer: Paris, France

Paris was called Lutetia Parisiorum, or simply Lutetia, during the Roman era. It was named after the Parissi people, a Gaullish tribe which roughly occupied the area at the time of the Roman conquest. With the collapse of the Roman Empire and the invasion by Germanic tribes, the city, which had never been particularly important in the first place, became a small garrison town and was renamed Paris.

In the 2nd century CE, London is recorded as Londinium, but no one really knows the origins of the name. It has been suggested over the years that the name comes from Celtic or pre-Celtic languages. London was allegedly founded by the Romans in 43 CE, but discoveries in 1999 and 2010 of Bronze Age remains and a 6,500 years old timber structure implies the settlement is much older than previously thought

The name Brussels seems to come from the Old Dutch "Broeksel", meaning "home in the marsh" ("broek" means marsh and "sel" home). Around 580, Saint Gaugericus, who had been born from Roman parents, built a chapel on an island in the river Senne, and this was to become Brussels. The hamlet was recorded as "Brosella" in 695 and it did not become a town until Charles, Duke of Lower Lorraine, had relics transferred into the chapel and fortifications built.

It seems that the Phoenicians were the first to develop Lisbon's harbour around 1,200 BCE. The Greeks and Romans referred to the city as Olisippo and then Olissipona. According to the legend, the city was named for Ulysses, who founded the settlement after he left Troy. Lisbon became part of the Roman Empire following the Punic Wars and was then occupied by several Germanic tribes during the 6th century. The Visigoths called the city "Ulishbona", a derivation from its Roman name.

Answer: Jerusalem, Israel

The city of Jerusalem was settled around 4,000 years BCE and a city called "Urusalimum" appears in ancient Egyptians records dating back from the 19th and 18th centuries BCE. The name of Jerusalem has been given many meanings: "foundation of the god Shalem", "dwelling of peace", founded in safety", "Shalem gives intructions"... The god Shalem is an ancient god dating possibly from before the Mesopotamians. The name "Yerushalayim" appears in the book of Joshua, in the Bible, and was given the meaning of "city of peace". The city of Jerusalem has also been called Jebus, Zion, Hierosolyma and Aelia Capitolina (Hadrian's nomen gentile was Aelius, and the city was dedicated to Jupiter Capitolinus). In Arabic, the city is called al-Quds, meaning "the Holy" but the Israeli government requires that the name Ūrsalīm be used in Arabic.

Historical evidences suggest the site of Damascus may have been occupied since 6,300 BCE, and possibly since 9,000 BCE, although the actual location of Damascus intra muros dates back from 2,000 BCE. During the 15th century, records give the name Dimashq al-Shām. "Al-Shām" is an Arabic term for "north" and "Syria" but the origins of "Dimashq" are less clear (it could mean "dweling"). The Latin name of the city, Damascus, comes from the Aramaic via Ancient Greek and means "a well-watered place".

The legend says that both Athena and Poseidon requested to be the patrons and protectors of the city, so they competed and each offered the city a gift. Poseidon struck the ground with his trident and produced a salt water spring. Athena created the olive tree as a symbol of peace and prosperity. The inhabitants of the city accepted the olive tree and named their city after the goddess Athena. It is unclear when the city started to be called Athens. It seems the site was occupied as early as 11,000 BCE and it has been continuously inhabited since 5,000 BCE.

There are several theories as to what the word Baghdad means. The most widely accepted one is that it means "God's gift" in Middle Persian, from "bag" (god) and "dād" (given). The name "Baghdadu" appears in records from the 9th century BCE although the city as it is known today did not exist until 762 CE, when the Abbasid caliph al-Masur ordered for a new city to be built on a site which had had numerous yet unimportant settlements before. Mansur wanted this new city to be the capital of the Abbasid Empire. By the 11th century, Baghdad was known as a metropolis.

Answer: Gibraltar, U.K.

The rock of Gibraltar was captured in 710 CE by the Arabic leader Tariq and it was renamed "the Mountain of Tariq", or "Jabal Tāriq" in Arabic. Gibraltar is the Spanish variation of the name. The Two Pillars of Hercules is the name given to two promontories on each side of the Strait of Gibraltar. The rock of Gibraltar is the Northern Pillar, but the Southern one is disputed between Jebel Musa, which is in Morocco, and Monte Hacho, which is in Ceuta, an autonomous city of Spain, situated on the North coast of Africa and surrounded by Morocco.

Algeciras was called "Portus Albus" (white port) by the Romans but it had already been an important harbour for the Phoenicians. It was destroyed by Germanic tribes, and it was re-built in 711 by the Moors. They named it al-Jazirah al-Khadra' ("green island") and it was conquered by Ferdinand IV of Castille in 1309. It was retaken by the Moors in 1368 and destroyed. The site remained abandoned until refugees from Gibraltar refounded a city in 1704, after Gibraltar was captured by the English.