15 Countries That Do Not Exist Anymore

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Introduction

15 Countries That Do Not Exist Anymore

1. Abyssinia

Abyssinia was a kingdom in North-East Africa also known as Ethiopian Empire. Originated from the Walwal incident during the ongoing conflict between the Kingdom of Italy and the Empire of Ethiopia (then commonly known as “Abyssinia”). Both Ethiopia and Italy pursued a policy of provocation against each other and later in the early 20th century, it split into the states of Eritrea and Ethiopia.

2. Austria-Hungary

A monarchy established in 1867, Austria-Hungary (also known as the Austro-Hungarian Empire) included not just Austria and Hungary but also parts of the Czech Republic, Poland, Italy, Romania, and the Balkans. The empire collapsed at the end of World War I.

3. Burma

The commission of the country decided to replace the English name “Burma” with “Myanmar”, because Myanma is the official name of the country in the Burmese language, and the aim was to have English place names aligned with Burmese place names and pronunciation. Hence, Burma officially changed its name to Myanmar in 1989. However, many countries still have not recognized the change.

4. Ceylon

The beautiful big island in the South of India was Ceylon now called Sri Lanka. First it was colonized by the Portuguese in the 16th Century who named the island Ceilão, which was later transformed into English as Ceylon. Later in 18^th century came in Dutch followed by the British. It gained its independence in 1948; however, it remained as a British dominion in the Commonwealth. Ceylon stopped existing in 1979 when its government renounced its dominion status and became the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka.

5. Czechoslovakia

Existing between 1918 and 1992, Czechoslovakia was invaded first by Nazi Germany and later by the soviet. During the worlds wars this country tasted democracy but its central position in the middle of Europe and its ethnic diversity made it very complicated for this country to endure the 20th Century. In 1989 the famous Velvet Revolution turned the communist regime into a parliamentary republic through purely peaceful means later in 1992, the government solved the growing nationalist tensions with a peaceful dissolution of the country into two: The Czech Republic and The Slovak Republic.

6. East and West Pakistan

The Dominion of Pakistan, including West Pakistan and East Pakistan (Province of East Bengal), was formally established on August 14, 1947. Bengal was an independent kingdom in Southern Asia that existed from year 1338 to 1539. The area has since been divided into the states of Bangladesh and Indian State. December 8, 1947, students at the University of Dhaka held the Bhasha-Andolon (Separatist movement based on language in Bengali language) movement in favor of the recognition of Bengali as a national language in Pakistan. East Pakistan (Bangladesh) formally achieved its independence from West Pakistan on December 17, 1971 and came up with new name Bangladesh and leaving West Pakistan as only Pakistan.

7. Gran Colombia

Gran Colombia was a South American country that included what is now Colombia, Panama, Venezuela, and Ecuador from 1819 to 1830. Gran Colombia ceased to exist when Venezuela and Ecuador seceded from the union.

8. Newfoundland

Newfoundland existed as the self-governing Dominion of Newfoundland from 1907 to 1949 which afterwards joined Canada as a province.

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, both Scotland and Wales were independent nations that eventually merged with England to form the United Kingdom according to The Acts of Union 1707. This declared that the kingdoms of England and Scotland were “United into One Kingdom by the Name of Great Britain”.

Siam is an exonym which means it is a name given by the outsiders to locate the place where an ethnic group lives heir to the kingdom of Ayutthaya, its people call their country Mueang Thai. The only country in South-East Asia that was never colonized by an European power. 0fficially known as Thailand since 1949 Siam still holds some mysteries like beautiful sceneries, old monuments and scene of a mystery regarding the gunshot death of its young monarch Kinda Ananda!

11. The Two Germanies: East/West Germany

End of World War II, lead the allies split Germany in four and in 1949, two sovereign countries were formed, commonly known as West and East Germany. The Berlin Wall drew an artificial division for 40 years that became a focus point for the Cold War until 1990, with the unification of Germany, that these two countries stopped existing.

12. Tibet

Emerged in Seventh Century the Tibetan Empire has always been in conflict with its neighbor China. In 1913, Tibet declared its independence and remained as a country till 1951 before it was merged into the People’s Republic of China. There has been a lot of news of an uprising against Chinese communist rule the young Dalai Lama is admired by his people as a living Buddha.

13. Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)

The Soviet Union existed from 1922 to 1991 while shaping the history of the 20th Century. Built under the ideology of communism, USSR had no precedent in modern history with Peristroika and Glasnost in the eighties the Soviet Union started reforming process that ended with its dissolution on the 26^th December 1991.

USSR was the most powerful communist nation in the world for decades until 1991 when it broke into 15 new countries: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldovia, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan.

14. United Arab Republic (UAR)

The two Arab nations Syria and Egypt merged as a Pan-Arab state, due to increasing worries that Syria would become a communist country, hence, they mutually created the UAR in 1958 and the Egyptian president Gamal Abdel-Nasser became the first and the only president of the new republic. He combined nationalization and social justice measures with the growing centralization and his government ended up in a coup-d’etat that declared Syria’s independence just three years after it was born, the UAR had a very short life disappearing in 1961.

15. Yugoslavia

Yugoslavia is the union of the Slavic community of Southern Europe that existed from 1918 to 2003. This kingdom came in existence during the World Wars and after the stoic resistance against the Nazis and Fascists, Marshal Josip Broz Tito became the first ever elected president and the kingdom became the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia until his death in 1980 and then communism was followed by nationalist which abolished its autonomy states. Later a chain of tragic ethnic wars were fought for over 10 years. In the end the states got independence of its national states, hence, Yugoslavia stopped existing in 2003.

Hope you found it interesting, how countries changes their names and boundaries, get split and get merged into each other on the political map of the globe. Please bring to our notice if another such country is missed out in this article. Will be happy receive an input.

(Photos are linked with the owner's website and Cover Photo of World Map taken from Pixabay)