This list covers English-language country names with their etymologies. Some of these include notes on indigenous names and their etymologies. Countries in italics are endonyms or no longer exist as sovereign political entities.

A

Afghanistan From Classical Persian افغان (afğān, "Afghan"), from Bactrian αβαγανο (abagano), first attested in the fourth century AD, most likely a compound of *apāka- ("distant, faraway"), from Proto-Iranian *Hapá, from Proto-Indo-Iranian *Hapá ("away"), from Proto-Indo-European *h₂epó + *-āna ("ethnic group"), from Proto-Indo-European *-nós, thus: "people from a distant land". Various scholars have proposed Sanskrit etymologies since the nineteenth century (especially prior to the 2007 publication of earlier Bactrian attestations for the word), but linguist Johnny Cheung notes that these are "extremely difficult to reconcile" with recent evidence pointing to a Bactrian source.

Albania

"Land of the Albanians", Latinized from Byzantine Greek Albanía (Αλβανία), land of the rebel Albanoi (Αλβανοι) mentioned in Michael Attaliates The History around AD 1080.Attaliates, Michael. History, as cited in Elsei, Robert. The Albanian Lexicon of Dion Von Kirkman, pp. 113–122. In her Alexiad, Anna Comnena also mentions a settlement called Albanon or Arbanon.As cited in Wilkes, J.J. The Illyrians, p. 279. Wiley-Blackwell, 1992. . Both may be survivals of the earlier Illyrian tribe, the Albani of the Albanopolis northeast of modern Durrës which appears in Ptolemy around AD 150.Madrugearu, A. & Gordon, M. The wars of the Balkan Peninsula, p. 146. Rowman & Littlefield, 2007. The demonym has been supposed to ultimately originate from Latin ("white") or from the proposed Proto-Indo-European *alb ("hill") or *alb- ("white").Online Etymology Dictionary. "Albania". Arbëri, its medieval endonym: "Land of the Albanians" in Albanian, presumably from the same source as above by way of rhotacism. An Arbanitai were mentioned in Attaliates's History as subjects of the Duke of Dyrrachium, near modern Durrës. Arnavutluk, its Ottoman Turkish name: "Land of the Albanians", a metathesis from Byzantine Greek Arbanitai and the Turkish locative suffix -lik or -luk. Shqipëri, its modern endonym: "Land of the Understanding", from the Albanian adverb shqip, "understanding each other".Kristo Frasheri. History of Albania (A Brief Overview). Tirana, 1964. A popular pseudoetymology ("Land of the Eagles") erroneously derives it instead from ("eagle").

Algeria

"Land of Algiers", a Latinization of French colonial name l'Algérie adopted in 1839.Scheiner, Virgile. "Le pays occupé par les Français dans le nord de l'Afrique sera, à l'avenir, désigné sous le nom d'Algérie." 14 October 1839. The city's name derives from French Alger, itself from Catalan Aldjère,Leschi, Louis. Origins of Algiers. 1941 - as cited in El Djezair Sheets. July 1941 - as cited in "History of Algeria". from the Ottoman Turkish Cezayir and Arabic al-Jazāʼir (, "the Islands"). This was a truncated form of the city's older name, Jazā'ir Banī Māzġānna (, "Islands of the sons of Mazġannā"), which referred to four islands off the city's coast which were held by a local Sanhaja tribe.al-Idrisi.Yaqut al-Hamawi. Algiers, p. 5. or Algier,Walker, J. & C. "North-Africa or Barbary II. Algier." Baldwin & Cradock (London), 1834. former names: As above.

Andorra Etymology unknown. Andorra was established as part of Charlemagne's Marca Hispanica and its name may derive from Arabic ad-Darra (, "the Forest") or Navarro-Aragonese andurrial ("scrubland").Online Etymology Dictionary. "Andorra." Accessed 16 September 2011. One folk etymology holds that it derives from the Biblical Endor, a name bestowed by Louis le Debonnaire after defeating the Moors in the "wild valleys of Hell".

Angola

"Land of Ndongo", from the Portuguese colonial name (Reino de Angola),Heywood, Linda M. & Thornton, John K. Central Africans, Atlantic Creoles, and the foundation of the Americas, 1585–1660, p. 82. Cambridge University Press, 2007. which erroneously derived a toponym from the Mbundu title ngola a kiluanje ("conquering ngola", a priestly title originally denoting a "chief smith",Fage, J.D. The Cambridge History of Africa, Vol. 3: The Cambridge History of Africa: From c. 1050 to c. 1600. Cambridge University Press, 1977. . Retrieved 23 September 2011.Collins, Robert O. & Burns, James M. A History of Sub-Saharan Africa, p. 153. Cambridge University Press, 2007. . Retrieved 23 September 2011. then eventually "king") held by Ndambi a Ngola () as lord of Ndongo, a state in the highlands between the Kwanza and Lukala Rivers.

Antigua and Barbuda Antigua: "Ancient", corrected from earlier Antego,Oliver, Vere Langford. The History of the Island of Antigua, One of the Leeward Caribbees in the West Indies, from the First Settlement in 1635 to the Present Time. Mitchell and Hughes (London), 1894. a truncation of the Spanish Santa Maria la Antigua,Murphy, A. Reg. Archaeology Antigua. "Timeline ." Accessed 23 September 2011 bestowed in 1493 by Christopher Columbus in honor of the Virgen de la Antigua ("Virgin of the Old Cathedral"Kessler, Herbert L. & Nirenberg, David. Judaism and Christian Art: Aesthetic Anxieties from the Catacombs to Colonialism. University of Pennsylvania Press, 2011. Retrieved 23 September 2011.), a revered mid-14th-century icon in the Chapel of La Antigua in Seville Cathedral.Wheatcroft, Geoffrey. "Oh, to Be in Antigua: This Caribbean Island Makes an Englishman Feel Right at Home." The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 274, October 1994. Barbuda: "Bearded" in Spanish, corrected from earlier Barbado, Berbuda, Barbouthos, &c.Frank, Mackenzie. Barbudaful. "Historical Notes ". Retrieved 23 September 2011. This may derive from the appearance of the island's fig trees, or from the beards of the indigenous people.

Argentina

The first description of the region by the word Argentina has been found on a Venetian map in 1536.The name Argentine (Spanish) El nombre de Argentina The name "Argentina" comes from Italian. Argentina (masculine argentino) means in Italian "(made) of silver, silver coloured", derived from the Latin "argentum" for silver. La Argentina ("the silvery"), a 17th-century truncation of Tierra Argentina ("Land beside the Silvery River", "Silvery Land"), named via (either in Italian or poetic Spanish) in reference to the Río de la Plata, so called by Italian explorer Sebastian Cabot during his expedition there in the 1520s after acquiring some silver trinkets from the Guaraní along the Paraná near modern-day Asunción, Paraguay.

Armenia

Etymology unknown. Latinized from Greek Armenía (), "Land of the Armenioi" () attested in the 5th century BC,Hecataeus of Miletus, as cited in from Old Persian Armina ( ) attested in the late 6th century BC,Darius I the Great. Behistun Inscription. (Which also lists the Elamite name Harminuya. of uncertain origin. It may be a continuation of the Assyrian ArmânumRigg Jr., Horace A. "A Note on the Names Armânum and Urartu", pp. 416418. Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 57, No. 4. December 1937. which was conquered by Naram-Sin in 2200 BCBabylonian copy of c. 2200 BC. URI 275, lines I.7 & 13, II.4, III.3 & 30. and has been identified with an Akkadian colony in the Diarbekr region. The name has also been claimed as a variant of the Urmani or Urmenu appearing in an inscription of Menuas of Urartu,Kurkjian, Vahan. History of Armenia. Michigan, 1968. as a proposed tribe of the Hayasa-Azzi known as the Armens (, Armenner)Also Armans and Armani (, Aṙamenner). Ishkhanyan, Rafael. Illustrated History of Armenia. Yerevan, 1989.Bauer, Elisabeth. Armenia: Past and Present, p. 49. 1981 or as a continuation of the Biblical Minni () and Assyrian Minnai,Orr, James. "Minni". International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. 1915. Retrieved 19 September 2011. corresponding to the Mannai. (Addition of the Sumerogram ḪAR would make this name equivalent to "the mountainous region of the Minni".Easton, M.G. "Minni". Illustrated Bible Dictionary, 3d Ed. Thomas Nelson, 1897. Retrieved 19 September 2011.) Diakonoff derived the name from a proposed Urartian and Aramaic amalgam *Armnaia ("inhabitant of Arme" or "Urme"),Diakonoff, I.M. The Pre-History of the Armenian People. Retrieved 17 September 2011. a region held by Proto-Armenians in the Sason mountains. Ultimately, the name has been connected to the Proto-Indo-European root *ar- ("assemble", "create") also found in the word Ararat, Aryan, Arta, &c.Gamkrelidze, Tamaz & Ivanov, Vyacheslav. "The Early History of Indo-European (aka Aryan) Languages". Scientific American. March 1990.Mallory, James P. "Kuro-Araxes Culture". Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture. Fitzroy Dearborn, 1997. The Armenians traditionally traced the name to an eponymous ancestor Aram (),Moses of Chorene. The History of Armenia, Book 1, Ch. 12. Chamich, Michael. History of Armenia from B.C. 2247 to the Year of Christ 1780, or 1229 of the Armenian era, p. 19. Bishop's College Press (Calcutta), 1827. sometimes equated with Arame, the earliest known king of Urartu.Ačaṙean, H. "Արամ". Hayocʿ Anjnanunneri Baṙaran, 2d Ed. Yerevan State University (Yerevan), 1942–62. Strabo derived the etymology from an Armenius of Armenium, a city on Lake Boebeïs in Thessaly,Strabo. Geographica. XI.iv.8. while Herodotus called them Phrygian colonists.Herodotus. VII.73. Hayastan, the local endonym: Etymology unknown. The modern Armenian Hayastan () derives from earlier Armenian Hayk () and Persian -stān (). Hayk derives from Old Armenian Haykʿ (), traditionally derived from a legendary patriarch named Hayk ().Panossian, Razmik. The Armenians: From Kings And Priests to Merchants And Commissars, p. 106. Columbia University Press, 2006. . Aram above was considered to be one of his descendants.

Australia

"Southern Land" in Neo-Latin, adapted from the legendary pseudo-geographical Terra Australis Incognita ("Unknown Southern Land") dating back to the Roman era. First appearing as a corruption of the Spanish name for an island in Vanuatu in 1625,Purchas, Samuel. "A note of Australia del Espíritu Santo, written by Master Hakluyt", in Hakluytus Posthumus, Vol. IV, pp. 1422–1432. 1625. "Australia" was slowly popularized following the advocacy of the British explorer Matthew Flinders in his 1814 description of his circumnavigation of the island.Flinders, Matthew. A Voyage to Terra Australis . 1814. Lachlan Macquarie, a Governor of New South Wales, used the word in his dispatches to England and recommended it be formally adopted by the Colonial Office in 1817.As cited in Letter of 12 December 1817. Weekend Australian, 30–31 December 2000, p. 16. The Admiralty agreed seven years later and the continent became officially known as Australia in 1824. In Flinders' book he published his rationale: "There is no probability, that any other detached body of land, of nearly equal extent, will ever be found in a more southern latitude; the name Terra Australis will, therefore, remain descriptive of the geographical importance of this country, and of its situation on the globe: it has antiquity to recommend it; and, having no reference to either of the two claiming nations, appears to be less objectionable than any other which could have been selected."Matthew Flinders, A voyage to Terra Australis (Introduction) . Retrieved 25 January 2013.