1611: arkansas and kansas May 13, 2019

'Kansas' and 'Arkansas' sound different, but look really similar. They are both US states named for the same thing, the Kansas River, but the name ultimately comes from the kká:ze tribe. The French originally controlled this area before the United States did, and much like 'Illinois', or 'Laos', the S in the spelling was not supposed to represent a sound. Indeed, in early Kansas history, it didn't; the original name comes from the river, so in this case it is possessive: the Kansa's River. The extra syllable in Arkansas is thought to come from a variant used by the Quapaw tribe to pronounce the kká:ze tribe's name, and the R was added to reflect the non-rhoticity of the Southern accent.