Etymology
In ancient Greek mythology, Europa was a Phoenician princess whom Zeus abducted after assuming the form of a dazzling white bull. He took her to the island of Crete where she gave birth to Minos, Rhadamanthus and Sarpedon. For Homer, Europe (Ancient Greek: Εὐρώπη, Eurṓpē; see also List of Greek place names) was a mythological queen of Crete, not a geographical designation. Later, Europa stood for central-north Greece, and by 500 BC its meaning had been extended to the lands to the north.
The name of Europa is of uncertain etymology. One theory suggests that it is derived from the Greek εὐρύς (eurus), meaning "wide, broad" and ὤψ/ὠπ-/ὀπτ- (ōps/ōp-/opt-), meaning "eye, face, countenance", hence Eurṓpē, "wide-gazing", "broad of aspect" (compare with glaukōpis (γλαυκῶπις 'grey-eyed') Athena or boōpis (βοὠπις 'ox-eyed') Hera). Broad has been an epithet of Earth itself in the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European religion. Another theory suggests that it is based on a Semitic word such as the Akkadian erebu meaning "to go down, set" (cf. Occident), cognate to Phoenician 'ereb "evening; west" and Arabic Maghreb, Hebrew ma'ariv (see also Erebus, PIE *h1regʷos, "darkness"). However, M. L. West states that "phonologically, the match between Europa's name and any form of the Semitic word is very poor".
Most major world languages use words derived from "Europa" to refer to the "continent" (peninsula). Chinese, for example, uses the word Ōuzhōu (歐洲); this term is also used by the European Union in Japanese-language diplomatic relations, despite the katakana Yōroppa (ヨーロッパ?) being more commonly used. However, in some Turkic languages the originally Persian name Frangistan (land of the Franks) is used casually in referring to much of Europe, besides official names such as Avrupa or Evropa.
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