Sometimes you just need a rebrand. You’ve got a great product, but suddenly you realise the name just doesn’t have that zing anymore. It turns out this marketing rule doesn’t just apply to chocolate bars and domestic cleaning products, but whole actual cities.
New York, USA
Previously New Amsterdam. That’s right, the Big Apple could have been the Big Edam.
New Amsterdam was founded by the Dutch in 1624, but the pesky British invaded a few decades later and renamed the town in 1674.
The name has stuck while that small town morphed into the mega-city it is today.
Istanbul, Turkey
Previously Byzantium, Constantinople, Lygos, New Rome, etc, etc. This fundamental crossroads between Asia and Europe has been populated since 660BC and it’s been suffering an identity crisis ever since.
Many historians are left fuzzy on exactly how many different names have been attributed to the area as centuries of war and trade have forced the city’s branding department in unusual directions.
Happily, the name Istanbul has been settled on since 1930 and hopefully it’s here to stay.
St Petersburg, Russia
Previously Leningrad.
Let’s get this straight – St Petersburg was originally called St Petersburg back in 1703 when Peter the Great began building brick buildings upon the small fishing town of Nyen he had recently conquered. But much more interesting is when the Communists took over Russia in the 20th century – they decided that in their new secular society this stunning and important port should simply be called Petrograd, or “Peter’s City”.
No saints allowed under Soviet rule, and certainly no Germanic words like “Burg” for the comrades!
A few years later, just after Lenin’s death in 1924, the city was rebranded yet again as Leningrad, or “Lenin’s City”, a name it held onto until 1991 when a citywide referendum led to its citizens reinstating the old title.
The last word though has to go to Lenin’s big-headed successor, Joseph Stalin – he decided to name 16 cities after himself throughout the Soviet Union during his lifetime. Freud would have called it “Lenin envy”.
(Featured image: peasap)
