European Geography By Letter - N

At first, I thought that there was just one cathedral in Paris but of course not. Notre Dame is the main roman catholic cathedral, but there are other branches of catholicism as well as orthodoxy. In the end, it seems there are ten of them!

So sad after the fire incident...

Nassau was named for William III of Orange-Nassau. Not for a German city.

I was thinking the same thing. Maybe if it said German house or castle or family?

I read "Siberia" instead of "Serbia". D'oh!

Because "Loch" is lake. Similarly you'd find Lake Michigan under M.

Los Angeles would be under L because the two words comprise the name of the city.

would Rio Grande be under "R" or "G"? and Los Angeles under "L" or "A"?

Maybe instead of having two questions about Naples you could replace one with Neman (river that flows through Belarus, Lithuania and Russia), Nizhny Novgorod (major city and the centre of the river tourism in Russia) or Novaya Zemlya (archipelago where Soviets tested the most powerful atomic bomb in history)?

I guess you must be from Russia? Nizhny Novgorod made the quiz, but I doubt the other two would get many guesses except maybe from Russian people - if that.

Agree entirely. That's how I knew it.

Vojvodina.

Got it thanks to Monica Seles.

The French cathedral Notre-Dame is hyphenated, although the US university is not.

I've only heard of it because of the Hugh Grant-Julia Roberts film.

Hmmm... Novosibirsk is the largest city in Siberia. Maybe Novokuznetsk is second or third. Only other one I can think of that starts with "N". Perhaps I should read the question a little more closely.

And perhaps you should have realized that it didn't fit in an European geography quiz.

I read "Siberia" too. Didn't occur to this wee little brain of mine that I had now strayed far beyond the bounds of Europe. My virtually empty mental rollodex of Siberian cities was too busy flying to "N".

When a clock is ticking down, the pressure's on and you're locked-in, sometimes you miss things you otherwise never would.

Pulled Novgorod from somewhere deep in the grey matter. Unfortunately I forgot to pick up Nizhny on the way.

Just did it again. Sigh.

Did anyone else get the Nottingham question thanks to Robin Hood?

Hmmm...I tried Novi Saad. I'm sure I've seen it spelled that way before. A quick Google search shows it's Novi Sad, but I'm wondering if it changed recently. Anyone?

All I'm seeing is Novi Sad. Maybe you saw it spelled that way in a different language?

No major language spells it with double A. Even languages that denote long vowels by doubling, like Finnish or Estonian, use a single A there. Novi Sad (Нови Сад) means “New Garden” or “New Orchard” in Serbian. It has had many official names with the same meaning throughout history: Neoplanta (Latin), Neusatz (German), Újvidék (Hungarian), Nový Sad (Slovak), Нови Сад (Rusyn). Anyway, it has always been with a single A in Serbian. If anyone had ever spelled it with double A in some other language, it must have been a really really old source. Or, it could have been a misspeling or a joke.

Nearly half of these are in Great Britain