Eorzea or Etheirys?

[Renathras]

The best real world example I can think of:

Aldenard = Australia - the continent itself
Eorzia = Oceania - the region of the world that includes the continent and surrounding island/ocean expanse
Hydaelyn = Earth - the name of the planet
Etheirys = Terra - the name the ancients (Roman empire) called Earth

It's not perfect, but that's probably the best general overview.

I used Australia because there's not really another good "Oceania" equivalent for other continents in the real world. Like North America "includes" the Caribbean islands by default, whereas Oceania includes areas that are not typically considered part of Australia (the continent) itself. Likewise, Africa includes Madagascar, otherwise we could use the word "Africa without Madagascar" for Aldenard and with Madagascar (as our La Noscea in this case) for Eorzia.

...but anyway, maybe that helps?

[Ransu]

The best real world example I can think of:

Aldenard = Australia - the continent itself
Eorzia = Oceania - the region of the world that includes the continent and surrounding island/ocean expanse
Hydaelyn = Earth - the name of the planet
Etheirys = Terra - the name the ancients (Roman empire) called Earth

It's not perfect, but that's probably the best general overview.

I used Australia because there's not really another good "Oceania" equivalent for other continents in the real world. Like North America "includes" the Caribbean islands by default, whereas Oceania includes areas that are not typically considered part of Australia (the continent) itself. Likewise, Africa includes Madagascar, otherwise we could use the word "Africa without Madagascar" for Aldenard and with Madagascar (as our La Noscea in this case) for Eorzia.

...but anyway, maybe that helps?

[Listrella]

Eorzea is the continent where the 3 starting city states as was as Ishgard and Ala Mhigo are on. Eiteirys is the name of the planet as a whole.

[Enkidoh]

Eorzea is the continent where the 3 starting city states as was as Ishgard and Ala Mhigo are on. Eiteirys is the name of the planet as a whole.

It's not actually, as others have stated, Eorzea is not a continent, it's the region of the world that encompases the continent of Aldernard and the island of Vlybrand. Etheirys is the Ancient name of the world, before the original Final Days and the Sundering, after which people called it Hydaelyn. Think of it like how in our world the continents of Europe and North America are often called 'The West', it's a geopolitical region that is larger than a continent, but not a continent in itself.

Part of the confusion is unfortunately because of SE's original promotions for the original version of the game (version 1.0) always stated 'Eorzea' as the game's setting with the name Hydaelyn barely rating a mention (which, did make sense, given gameplay back then was restricted to Eorzea only and not Hydaelyn at large)., and this continued into ARR. And now with EW and the likes of Urianger immediately swapping to referring to the world as 'Etheirys' even when he has no reason or need to do so, it's made things even more confusing.

[Rongway]

the likes of Urianger immediately swapping to referring to the world as 'Etheirys' even when he has no reason or need to do so, it's made things even more confusing.

It's absolutely appropriate to his character, though. Of course Urianger is going to choose the ancient name over the modern one if he knows it. Nevermind that the majority of the world population probably doesn't even know the planet as "Hydaelyn" to begin with, choosing to call it "this star" instead.

[Hasrat]

It's absolutely appropriate to his character, though. Of course Urianger is going to choose the ancient name over the modern one if he knows it. Nevermind that the majority of the world population probably doesn't even know the planet as "Hydaelyn" to begin with, choosing to call it "this star" instead.

Oh great. I haven't even started EW yet, and already another reason to find him irritating.

Somebody get this man a book on social norms.

[Cleretic]

And now with EW and the likes of Urianger immediately swapping to referring to the world as 'Etheirys' even when he has no reason or need to do so, it's made things even more confusing.

Everyone who does that is from Sharlayan, and Sharlayan is an entire nation full of massive nerds. I firmly believe that every single Sharlayan would latch on to an obscure but technically correct term and just be itching for a chance to drop a 'well actually' when someone questions them.

It's also just got a purely functional purpose in Endwalker. A planet having the same name as a god is just fine in almost all contexts both fictional and non-fictional (we don't get confused between Mars the planet and Mars the god, after all), but Endwalker is a story where 'the planet Hydaelyn' and 'the entity Hydaelyn' are relevant and distinct figures with separate but intertwined story arcs. In that context, it's just easier to give one of them a new name to make sure there's no confusion.

Especially since it's a story being translated into multiple languages, so any linguistic tricks fly out the window. Like, I know in English you could conceivably shoot for a 'Mother Earth' angle and call them 'Hydaelyn' for the planet and 'Mother Hydaelyn' for the entity, but I don't know if that cultural context exists in, say, German. Also going for that angle would probably piss off the people who hate Hydaelyn, and in a story that's trying to set up an equalized dichotomy between Team Hydaelyn and Team Zodiark you don't want to rhetorically stack the deck any more than necessary.

[Renathras]

In the strictest of senses, the "real world" seems more like Aldenard is Africa, Illsabard is Eur-Asia, Meracydia is either Australia or Antarctica, and the New World the Americas. But it's a tenuous "parallel" in that sense...though some things are more or less in the right place (Doma is more or less where China is, Hingashi would be Japan, Kugane...Singapore probably, Radz for India [which was a separate continent at one time that drifted into Asia, pushing up the Himalayas in the process], Gyr Abania for the Middle East or Saudi peninsula). There's not EXACTLY a Europe, but Old Sharl and the northern sea islands are probably more or less that, complete with the Greek/Western Europe and Scandinavian vibes, respectively.)

None of that's perfect or even necessarily implied (for example, Ishgard here would be in north-central Africa, probably around Libya or maybe Tunisia or old Carthage, yet very clearly has dark-ages European motifs and inspiration, making it more akin to Gaul/France), though it is kinda cool how the general continents sorta work to it and at least SOME cultures/civilizations are kind of where you might expect.

I was using the relationship between Australia and Oceania because it's kind of what's going on here in the naming terms.

EDIT:

And now with EW and the likes of Urianger immediately swapping to referring to the world as 'Etheirys' even when he has no reason or need to do so, it's made things even more confusing.

Agreed with all your post EXCEPT this, and the reason why is...

It's absolutely appropriate to his character, though. Of course Urianger is going to choose the ancient name over the modern one if he knows it. Nevermind that the majority of the world population probably doesn't even know the planet as "Hydaelyn" to begin with, choosing to call it "this star" instead.

...PARTLY that. But the other part is that you guys have to remember he ALSO spends a good chunk of Endwalker with the Lopporits. And they call the planet Etherys. So it stands to reason he'd do a "When in Rome..." or "This is how they know you..." thing and just start using their word for it, both to avoid confusion/frustration AND because he's the bookish, "technically correct" type. I could see him getting annoyed talking with Lopporits and saying Hydaelyn for the planet, only for them to say "Oh yes, she's a great person, she is", mistakenly thinking he's talking about the goddess/Primal/Venat.

So it's honestly pretty logical for him to make the change. And given the scholarly, bookish types that comprise Sharlayan, it stands to reason they'd be using the word in general. It was a great secret up until now, but now the word is out, and the ones in the know were already using it since they'd already been talking with the Lopporits for 100 years or whatnot. Or to put it another way:

Everyone who does that is from Sharlayan, and Sharlayan is an entire nation full of massive nerds. I firmly believe that every single Sharlayan would latch on to an obscure but technically correct term and just be itching for a chance to drop a 'well actually' when someone questions them.

That.

FFXIV uses old English and bases their phrasing on a lot of old languages. The term planet came from the Greek word planetes which means wanderer. Planets were viewed the same as stars in early times.

That's not even the worst part. They used to think that everything in the skies was a dome over the (flat) Earth, or possibly, if the Earth was a sphere, a bigger sphere. The idea was that the stars were flecks of some kind on that dome, and the dome/sphere rotated around the Earth, making what we think are moving skies.

Planets, on the other hand (because of the way the Earth "catches up" to them when we orbit for the ones outside of our orbit, so Mars and out) do this weird thing where they have a little loop in the sky where they start appearing to go "backward" as we approach them, then resume their normal motion once we pass them. Early astronomers legit came up with some pretty ingenious and complex explanations for this (like inner layers of dome/sphere within the larger background sphere) and both mapped AND mathed out these motions well before realizing that Earth was not flat, Earth was not (as far as we know) the center of the Universe, or even the center of the solar system, or what planets and stars are, or their distinctions.

So in all of that sense, using the archaic "star" for planet kind of makes sense given the level of technological and cultural development in FFXIV's world.

Though it did throw me off at the start, too. It helps that they're literally NEVER talking about actual stars (the giant balls of nuclear reacting gas) kind, so there's really no confusion. The only case where I'm not ENTIRELY sure about that is the Last Dregs where Jammingway notes the "dead star" above them. Given the rough size of a burnt out white dwarf, and the fact the whole place is a Dynamis acid trip to begin with, that's the ONE case where it might actually be referencing a star. Or the dead remnants of one, rather. But even there, it could very well be speaking of a dead planet, too. I guess I kind of got used to the way Kingdom Hearts treated planets like stars as well and just roll with it.

Well, I guess the ASTs could be talking about actual stars...but they could also be referring to them as planets/solar systems, so it's kinda weird. As far as I've been able to tell, the people of FFXIV have no concept of "solar system" at any rate. And we've seen nothing to indicate any star system has more than one planet.

[Iscah]

In the strictest of senses, the "real world" seems more like Aldenard is Africa...

Aldenard is not Africa. It is, loosely, Europe turned sideways (before they started aiming for a 1:1 comparison to an Earth map at a large scale), maybe with the northern bit of Africa fused into it, but not the whole continent.

Everything we know so far to be "Meracydian" is from Africa. Maybe it's a hybrid Africa-Australia but we've seen no indication of it to this point. It's more like Africa detached from Europe and drifted southeast.

Meanwhile, Ilsabard seems to be Russia detached from the rest of Asia, which has slid off horizontally to the east to become Othard – which is presumably why they seem to be having a hard time actually squeezing it all into the globe at a convincing size and leaving so much of it as blank ocean.