How And From When The "Atlantic Ocean" Name Has Been Started To Use? Was It Named After Any Country Or What?

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Julii Brainard Profile
Julii Brainard answered
The name comes from Greek mythology. Not from the mythical lost underwater city of Atlantis -- although that might have come into it, too. But from the phrase (translated from Greek) "Sea of Atlas". Remember in Greek stories Atlas was the poor guy -- well, God really, so not that badly off -- who got stuck with the job for eternity of holding the sky and the Earth apart. In later western culture we have the misconception that this was holding the Earth on his shoulders, and this is exactly how Atlas is often portrayed.

Atlas earned this punishment for being on the wrong side in a war between the Gods.

The Greek historian Herodotus mentioned the Atlantic called as such in some writings dating from 450 BC. To the Greeks the Atlantic was the World Ocean, they didn't know about others. They thought the lost city of Atlantis was in the Mediterranean, though.

So what did other cultures call the Atlantic Ocean, before the Greek name gained predominance? Honestly, I don't know. It seems very likely that the Vikings, north and south Americans and Africans must have all had their own name for what we all call the Atlantic, though.
Anonymous Profile
Anonymous answered
Actually, in answer to the first answer, Atlas was a titan. Just not a very important one, aside from his punishment. And I have hear it called many thing from the Sea of Trolls, to The Sea of Monsters. The Ethiopic was the old name for the southern part of the Atlantic, not the entire thing.
Anonymous Profile
Anonymous answered
I read the name was Ethiopic Ocean, though I haven't found if there were any other names given to it in between.

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