| @cartophiliac: There's an interesting linguistic question here, though: at what point does it stop being a mistake and become an alternative name? After all, the Germans call their country "Deutschland" but "quite a lot of people" call it "Germany". Everyone agrees that "Germany" is the English name for the country. The OED says that the word "Holland" is "... usually extended by Englishmen and other foreigners to the [whole] kingdom of the Netherlands." (Note that the OED only attempts to document how words are used; it does not purport to give "official" definitions.) So, how far are we from the situation that "Holland" is an English name for the Netherlands, even taking into account that it is based on a mistake? Of course, if we go down that route, we'd have to accept that "England" is an American English name for the UK. :-) OK, I'm rambling so I'll stop. For what it's worth, I don't think that "Holland" should be accepted as an alternate. |
