South America (Fondly Names)

Argentina
“Land Of Silver”
 Argentina, meaning "land of silver," is a rich and
vast land,second largest (after Brazil) in South
America and eighth largest in the world. 

Aruba
"Island of giants"
 "Island of giants", remarking on the
comparatively large stature of the native
Caquetíos compared to Europeans. Gold
was not discovered on Aruba for another
300 years.

Bolivia
“Land of Bolivar”
 "Land of Bolivar" in New Latin, in honor
of Simón Bolívar,one of the leading
generals in the Spanish American wars
of independence. Bolívar had given his
lieutenant Antonio José de Sucre the
option to keep Upper Peru under Peru,
to unite it with the United Provinces of
Rio de la Plata, or to declare its independence. A national assembly opted
for independence, then sought to placate Bolívar's doubts by naming
Bolívar as the first president of a country
named in his honor.

Brazil
"Brazilwood"
 "Brazilwood",from the Portuguese Terra do
Brasil, from pau-brasil ("brazilwood", lit. "red-
wood"),a name derived from its similarity to
red-hot embers (Latin:brasa). The name may
have been a translation of the Tupi ibirapitanga, also meaning "red-wood".
The ending -il derives from the diminutive Latin suffix –ilus

 "Hy-Brazil", or "Ilha da Brasil" 

 The appearance of islands named "Bracile", "Hy-Brazil", or "Ilha da Brasil"
on maps as early as the c. 1330 portolan chart of Angelino Dulcert
sometimes leads etymologists to question the standard etymology. While
most of these islands of Brazil are found off the coast of Ireland and may
be taken to stem from a Celtic rendering of the legendaryIsle of the
 Blessed, the 1351 Medici Atlas places one Brazil near Ireland and a
second one off the Azores near Terceira Island.

British Virgin Island

“Santa Ursula y las Once Mil
Vírgenes”(Las Virgenes)
 The first European sighting of
the Virgin Islands was
by Christopher Columbus in
1493 on his second voyage
to the Americas. Columbus
gave them the fanciful
name Santa Ursula y las Once Mil Vírgenes (Saint Ursula and her 11,000
Virgins), shortened to Las Vírgenes (The Virgins), after the legend of Saint
Ursula.
Chile
"Men of Chilli"
 The name dates to the "men of Chilli",the
survivors of the first Spanish expedition into
the region in 1535 under Diego de Almagro.
Almagro applied the name to
the Mapocho valley, but its further
etymology is debated. 

Ecuador
“Quito,”
 A former name: "Quitus", after its capital Quito, truncated from the original
Spanish "Santiago de Quito" and "San Francisco de Quito", after
an Andean Indian tribe recently annexed to the Incan Empire at the time of
its conquest by the Spanish.

Falkland Island
“Islas Malvinas”
 The Spanish name for the islands,
"Islas Malvinas", is derived from a
French original "Îles Malouines" (St
Malo Islands).

French Guiana
“Sacred Land Of Biodiversity”
 French Guiana is home to many different ecosystems: tropical rainforests,
coastal mangroves, savannahs, inselbergs and many types ofwetlands.
French Guiana has a high level of biodiversity in terms of
both flora and fauna. This is due to the presence of old-growth forests(i.e.,
ancient/primary forests), which are biodiversity hotspots. o

Guyana
"Land of Many Waters" 
 The name "Guyana" is derived
from Guiana, the original name for the
region that formerly included Guyana
(British Guiana),Suriname (Dutch
Guiana), French Guiana, and parts
of Colombia, Venezuela and Brazil.
According to the Oxford English
Dictionary,the name comes from an Amerindian word meaning "land of
many waters".

Paraguay
“Guarani”
  Guarani words para ("river")
and guai ("crown"), meaning "crowned
river".A third meaning may
be para("river"), gua ("from"), i ("water")
meaning "river that comes from the
water", referring to the bog in the north of the country, which is actually in
Brazil.

Peru
“Biru”
 The most popular theory derives it from
the native word biru, meaning "river"
(compare with the River Biru in modern
Ecuador). 
“Pelu”
  Pelu, presumptively an old native name of the region.

Suriname
“Surinen”
 The earliest known native American
inhabitants of the region.

Turks And Caicos Island

“Turk-Caicos”
 The name 'Turk' is derived from the local cactus, the Turk's-cap cactus
(read Melocactus communis in Latin). The name 'Caicos' is derived from
the Lucayan word for a string of islands, caya hico.

Uruguay
"Land beside the Uruguay River"
 A shortened form of
the Spanish Republica Oriental del
Uruguay ("Eastern Republic of the
Uruguay"). The Uruguay itself derives
fromGuaraní, although the precise
meaning is unknown. Some derive it from urugua ("shellfish")
and i ("water"), others from uru (a kind of bird in the region), gua ("proceed
from"), and i.

Venezuela
"Little Venice"
 "Little Venice", from Italian Venezuola,
the diminutive of Venezia (Italian:
"Venice"), for the native stilt-houses built
on Lake Maracaibo which reminded the
explorers Alonso de Ojeda and Amerigo
Vespucci of buildings in Venice.