Algeria is DZ, because it's Dzayer
• updated
I was working on the translations for my Fediverse share page (you can contribute on Weblate), when I stumbled upon a language code I’ve never seen before: ar-DZ. It was clear that ar is Arabic, but what’s DZ? A quick search in the ISO 3166 list showed that it was, in fact, Algeria. Okay, but why? I decided to find out.
Note: This page used to explain my search process. I have now omitted it for… reasons.
The answer
I have looked through countless Wikipedia articles until I’ve finally found what I was looking for. The answer to my question — Why is Algeria’s ISO 3166 code DZ? — lies in a very specific Wikipedia article: ISO 3166-1 alpha-2. In it, it is said loud and clear:
Code taken from name in Arabic الجزائر al-Djazā’ir, Algerian Arabic الدزاير al-Dzāyīr, or Berber ⴷⵣⴰⵢⵔ Dzayer
When I posted this on the Fediverse, I’ve got some helpful replies that helped me refine this result. ButterflyOfFire (who is from Algeria) said that the actual pronunciation is more like Lezzayer (written ⵍⴻⵣⵣⴰⵢⴻⵔ). And lunabee advised me to not use the word “berber”, opting for “amazigh” when talking about the people, and “tamazight” when talking about the language.
So, once again:
Algeria’s ISO 3166-2 code, DZ, comes from its Arabic and/or Tamazight name, which is al-Dzayir and Dzayer, respectively.