"The" Philippines

[FRITZ JUENGLING]

We also have, or have had, The Netherlands (which I think is clear), The Ukraine,  (and as every reader of Victorian colonial exploits reads), The Sudan, and The Gambia.  From my reading, I don't think the last refers to only the river, but to an area, which has become the country. I don't think 'The' is obligatory except for 'Netherlands.'
In German, we have 'die Schweiz', which is short for 'die schweizere Eidgenossenschaft, die Türkei, der Sudan, (der) Irak, (der) Iran, die Niederlande, die Ukraine, die Tschechoslowakei, die Tschechei, der Tschad, die Vereinigten Staaten,and die USA (which is always plural!).  The are certainly others. It has always intrigued me why English and German use articles in front of country names, some of which are optional, but German has so many more than English.
Fritz Juengling

>>> wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM 03/30/05 04:46AM >>>
Short for "the Philippine Islands."

JL

Yan Zhang <zhangyx106 at YAHOO.COM> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Yan Zhang
Subject: "The" Philippines
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Hi,
I am a Chinese TESOL teacher. In today's dictation exercise, there is a sentence "China is the first leg of the President¡ s four-nation tour, which also includes Japan, South Korea and the Philippines." One student asked me why there is a "the" in front of Philippines, while usually people don't put definite article before a country name. Could anybody help? Thanks a lot.

Yan


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