Name of Mexico
Several hypotheses seek to explain the etymology of the name Mexico (México in modern Spanish) which dates, at least, back to 14th century Mesoamerica.
Among these are expressions in the Nahuatl language such as, "Place in the middle of the century plant" (Mexitli) and "Place in the Navel of the Moon" (Mēxihco) along with the currently used shortened form in Spanish, "belly button of the moon" ("el ombligo de la luna"), used in both 21st century speech and literature.
On 22 November 2012, outgoing Mexican President Felipe Calderón proposed changing the official name of the country to México.
This vast territory was composed of different intendencias and provinces, successors of the kingdoms and captaincies general administered by the vice-regal capital of Mexico City.
In 1814 the Supreme Congress of the revolutionary forces that met at Apatzingán (in today's state of Michoacán) drafted the first constitution,[4] in 1814 whereby the name América Mexicana ("Mexican America") was chosen for the country.
The former tried to preserve the status quo of the vice-royalty, menaced by the liberal reforms taking place in Spain, through the establishment of an autonomous constitutional monarchy under an independence hero.
[12] The name "Mexican Empire" was briefly revived from 1863 to 1867 by the conservative government that instituted a constitutional monarchy for a second time under Maximilian of Habsburg.
On 22 November 2012, incumbent President Felipe Calderón sent to the Mexican Congress a piece of legislation to change the country's name officially to simply Mexico.
These last two suggestions are deprecated by linguist Frances Karttunen,[16] since the final form "Mēxihco" differs in vowel length from both proposed elements.
The name Mexico has been commonly described to be a derivative from Mexica, the autonym of the Aztec people,[17] but said affirmation is controversial as there are many competing etymologies for both terms[18] and given the fact that in many old sources, 'Mexica' simply appears as the way to call the inhabitants of the island of Mexico (where Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco were located) in their native Nahuatl;[19] implying that instead of Mexica being the source of the name 'Mexico', the opposite would be true.
During the sixteenth century this sound evolved into a voiceless velar fricative ([x], like the ch in Scottish "loch"), and México began to be pronounced [ˈmexiko].
Nevertheless, there was ambivalence in the application of this rule in Mexican toponyms: México was used alongside Méjico, Texas and Tejas, Oaxaca and Oajaca, Xalixco and Jalisco, etc., as well as in proper and last names: Xavier and Javier, Ximénez and Jiménez, Roxas and Rojas are spelling variants still used today.
In present-day Spanish, México is pronounced [ˈmexiko] or [ˈmehiko], the latter pronunciation used mostly in dialects of southern Mexico, the Caribbean, much of Central America, some places in South America, and the Canary Islands and western Andalusia in Spain where [x] has become a voiceless glottal fricative ([h]),[22][23] while [ˈmeçiko] in Chile and Peruvian coast where voiceless palatal fricative [ç] is an allophone of [x] before palatal vowels [i], [e].
[25] The same rule applies to all Spanish toponyms in the United States, and on some occasions in the Iberian Peninsula, even though in most official or regional languages of Spain (Asturian, Leonese and Catalan) and Portuguese, the x is still pronounced [ʃ].
