Countries With the Same Name as Their Capital City

A country and its capital share a name more often than you would guess — roughly a dozen cases, plus a few near-misses where one adds "City". It usually happens one of two ways: a city-state that is a country and a capital at once, or a colonial capital that lent its name to the territory around it (or the reverse).

Exact matches

• Djibouti — the country and its capital have exactly the same name; the city came first, as a French colonial port.
• Singapore — a city-state, so the country and the city are the same entity.
• Monaco — likewise a city-state on the French Riviera.
• San Marino — the country is named after the city, which is named after Saint Marinus, its legendary 4th-century founder.
• Luxembourg — the country and its capital, Luxembourg City, share the name; "City" is added only to disambiguate.
• Vatican City — country and capital are one and the same, the smallest sovereign state on Earth.
• Brunei — the country's full name is Brunei Darussalam and its capital is Bandar Seri Begawan, but the capital was called Brunei Town until 1970, so it counts historically.

Country plus "City"

• Guatemala and Guatemala City.
• Mexico and Mexico City (Ciudad de México).
• Panama and Panama City.
• Kuwait and Kuwait City.
• Belize and Belize City — though Belize City is no longer the capital; Belmopan took over in 1970 after a hurricane.

Which came first?

In the Americas the pattern is usually city-then-country: Guatemala City, Panama City and Mexico City were Spanish colonial hubs whose provinces took their names, and the modern republics kept them. In the Gulf, Kuwait City is the original settlement and the country grew around it. Djibouti's port was built by France in 1888 and the surrounding colony, then country, was named for it. The city-states — Singapore, Monaco, Vatican City — never had a distinction to make.