Užupis Everywhere

Ambassador H.E. David Ding

KENT

The name is of Celtic origin and is one of the oldest place names of the British Isles still in use today, being first recorded in a periplus in ancient Greek of the c. 320s B.C. by Pytheas. The original work, which does not survive, he is quoted explicitly by Strabo (Geog. 1.4.3)and implicitly by Diodorus (BH 5.21).

ὁ δὲ πλειόνων ἢ δισμυρίων τὸ μῆκος ἀποφαίνει τῆς νήσου, καὶ τὸ Κάντιον ἡμερῶν τινων πλοῦν ἀπέχειν τῆς Κελτικῆς φησι^[17]

Translation:

Yet Pytheas declares that the extent of the island is more than 20,000 stadia and says that Kantion is several days’ sail from Keltike.

As such, it has been claimed as the “oldest recorded name still in use in England”.

The meaning has been explained as ‘coastal district’, ‘corner-land’ or ‘land on the edge’ (Welsh: cant ‘bordering of a circle, tyre, edge’;

Breton: cant ‘circle’;

Dutch: kant ‘side, edge’).

In Latin sources the area is called Cantia or Cantium, while the Anglo-Saxons referred to it as Cent, Cent lond or Centrīċe.