Guinea.

Internationalism, ultimately through the widespread European name tradition represented by Portuguese Guiné (“Guinea”). The precise route by which the name entered Norwegian is uncertain. Portuguese Guiné (“Guinea”) was well established by the fifteenth century; Gomes Eanes de Zurara completed the first version of his Crónica da Guiné in 1453. Related European forms, however, are older than the Portuguese maritime expansion: Gunuia occurs on a Genoese map from around 1320 and Ginyia in the Catalan Atlas of 1375. The name originally referred to a much broader part of Africa than the modern country. The present-day Republic of Guinea takes its name from this older geographical designation. The present-day country's territory was known during the colonial period as Fransk Guinea (“French Guinea”) from 1893 until independence in 1958. Ultimate origin uncertain. Several explanations have been proposed: * One widely discussed theory connects the name with an Amazigh or Berber word represented by Tarifit aynaw or agnaw (“mute; one whose language is not understood”), which came to be applied to peoples south of the Sahara. * Another theory, associated with Leo Africanus, connects the name with Djenné, the historically important trading city on the Niger in present-day Mali. * An older theory derives Guinea from the name Ghana, but this has been questioned because forms resembling Guinea are attested in Europe before the Portuguese exploration of the West African coast. * Store norske leksikon mentions a further possible source, guaya-na (“the esteemed people”), said to have been the name of a West African kingdom in the fourteenth century. None of these explanations is securely established. Parallel international adaptations include Danish Guinea, Swedish Guinea, German Guinea, Dutch Guinee, French Guinée and English Guinea.