Trinidad and Tobago in other languages: Port of Spain and corporations

Trinidad y Tobago, Trinidad ja Tobago, Trinidad og Tobago: the word for and

Two island names joined by a conjunction make this one of the easiest country names to compare across languages. Trinidad and Tobago stay almost unchanged, and the list is in effect a table of words for and: y in Spanish, i in Polish and Bosnian, и in Russian, ja in Finnish and Estonian, og in Danish and Norwegian, və in Azerbaijani, ve in Crimean Tatar and häm in Bashkir and Tatar. Polish adds its own spelling, Trynidad i Tobago, and Lithuanian declines both names as Trinidadas ir Tobagas.

In the Cyrillic languages of Russia the conjunction changes from row to row: Тринидад да Тобаго in Komi and Meadow Mari, Тринидад уонна Тобаго in Yakut, Тринидад болн Тобаго in Kalmyk; Chuvash, Kabardian, Lezgi and Abkhaz attach a suffix to the names themselves, as in Тринидадрэ Тобагорэ. Hebrew writes טרינידד וטובגו (Ṭrīnīdad və-Ṭōbagō) with the prefix ו for and, Greek Τρινιντάντ και Τομπάγκο with και, and Arabic ترينيداد وتوباغو (Tirīnīdād wa-Tūbāġū) with و.

A few languages adapt the first name: Catalan writes Trinitat, Cornish Trynses and French Trinité in Trinité-et-Tobago.

Port of Spain, Puerto España, Port-d’Espagne

The capital has an English name with a Spanish meaning, and languages split on whether to translate it. Spanish says Puerto España, Portuguese Porto de Espanha, French Port-d’Espagne and Esperanto Portospeno. Most others keep the English words and transcribe them: Порт-оф-Спейн (Port-of-Spejn) in Russian, ポート・オブ・スペイン (Pōto-obu-Supein) in Japanese and פורט־אוף־ספיין (Pōrṭ-ōf-Speyn) in Hebrew.

Arabic has both kinds in one row, بورت إسبانيا (Būrt Isbāniyā) beside بورت أوف سبين (Būrt ūf Sbīn), which follows the English sound. Persian adds بندر اسپین (Bandare Espeyn) and Chinese writes 西斑牙港 (Xībānyá Gǎng). The Nahuatl and Quechua entries, Ācalquīxōhuayān Caxtillān and Ispaña Wamp’urani, share nothing with the English form.

From counties to corporations: the codes since 2015

ISO 3166-2 reshaped the list for Trinidad and Tobago in 2015. The codes TT-ETO and TT-WTO for Eastern and Western Tobago were deleted and replaced by one code, TT-TOB, for Tobago as a whole; Rio Claro-Mayaro lost TT-RCM and became TT-MRC, written Mayaro-Rio Claro. In 2020 ISO renamed the category of Arima, Chaguanas and Point Fortin from municipality to borough and that of Port of Spain and San Fernando to city.

Four corporations have their seat in a town whose name differs from their own: Diego Martin in Petit Valley, San Juan-Laventille in Aranguez, Couva-Tabaquite-Talparo in Couva and Rio Claro-Mayaro in Mayaro. Tobago is governed from Scarborough.