Indonesia
/ˌɪn.dəˈniː.ʒə/noun
A country and archipelago in Southeast Asia consisting of thousands of islands between the Indian and Pacific oceans.
Did you know?The name Indonesia was introduced in the 1850s by British ethnographer James Richardson Logan and later popularized by German scholar Adolf Bastian.
Etymological Timeline
Ancient Greek
Greek
Indos
“The Indus River and the lands associated with it; the source of the name India.”
Ancient Greek
Greek
nesos
“Island.”
1850s
English
Indunesia
“A proposed scholarly name formed from Indo- and Greek nesos, meaning the Indian islands.”
1850s
English
Indonesia
“A variant spelling introduced in the same scholarly naming tradition for the Malay Archipelago.”
1884
German
Indonesien
“The name used and popularized by ethnologist Adolf Bastian for the island region.”
20th Century
Indonesian/English
Indonesia
“The modern national name adopted by the independent Republic of Indonesia.”