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simplythere t1_j6gelqj wrote

Reply to comment by series_hybrid in ELI5: How do they come up with names for countries in foreign languages? by bentobam

Ohh… I always thought it was because “Peking” is close to the Cantonese pronunciation of Beijing (bak-king) and the historical European trade routes were through HK and Guangzhou. Then after the Communists made Mandarin the main dialect, the spelling was changed to reflect the pinyin of the Mandarin pronunciation of the capital which is Beijing.

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series_hybrid t1_j6huu5h wrote

I'd be willing to bet that your understanding of this is accurate!

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