Ethiopia comes from a Greek word which means ‘sunburned’ or ‘burnt face’.

The original word, “Aethiopia” appears in the Iliad and the Odyssey, and is used to describe not just what we now refer to as Ethiopia, but also the Sudan and all other parts of Africa south of Egypt. This word itself comes from “Aithops” which means “of burned face”. Homer described the Ethiopians in his stories as people whose skin had been turned brown by the sun, which is apparently how Homer thought the Ethiopians looked to him. Of course, conventional wisdom also suggests that Homer was blind, so this really doesn’t make a whole lot of sense either way.