When it comes to place names, The Scrapbook is decidedly reactionary. We finally, reluctantly, made our peace with the demise of Mukden and Peking, but until the day someone pours us a Mumbai gin martini, we’re still Bombay all the way.
So we hope the gentleman who emailed last week urging us to stop writing “the Czech Republic” and start saying “Czechia” instead will understand if we are slow to take up the new usage. Our correspondent pointed out that Czechia has been the “official, internationally recognized short name since May 2016.” Moreover, the U.S. State Department is using Czechia, as is Switzerland’s Department of Foreign Affairs, as is Google Maps.
But “everybody else does it” has never been a strong argument in our book. What’s more, he urged us to read the official memorandum, dated December 2, 2016, informing us that “the Czech government has formally approved ‘Czechia’ as the official short (geographic) name of the Czech Republic.” Well, we did read it, and meaning no disrespect to our Czech friends, we note that the letterhead over the official memorandum says “Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic.”
So we’ll be sticking with old-fashioned formality, at least until the day we receive a memorandum from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Czechia, with a letterhead to match.
