1/ It's a joke, I know, but there's a nugget of truth here: until 1914 the North Sea was generally known in English as the German Ocean. The name "North Sea" was sometimes reserved for the Atlantic north of Shetland (which is now generally known as the Norwegian Sea). 
https://twitter.com/NoContextBrits/status/1882368155840024860
2/ The British renaming of the German Ocean wasn't simply a unilateral creation of a new name, however - the term 'North Sea' had already been in use for centuries by the Dutch, who originally named it in opposition to the "South Sea" (off Frisia, the modern Wadden Sea).
3/ Ironically, the Germans themselves didn't use the term "German Ocean" but followed the Dutch and Danes in calling it the Nordzee. So although the British change of name was political, it simply brought the naming into line with its North Sea neighbours.
4/ This is obviously a very different scenario from Trump's unilateral imposition of the "Gulf of America", a name with no historical precedents as far as I know. Even Hitler was following historical naming when he unilaterally renamed Austria as 'Ostmark' in 1938. /end
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
