Do you know where did the name “Canada” came from ?
First recorded appearance of the word “Canada” on maps is in 1566 but it was first used in 1535 by early explorer Jacques Cartier in his records. A very interesting story, Canada basically got its name by mistake. When Jaques Cartier, a French explorer, came to the new world, he met with local Natives who invited them to their ‘kanata’ (the word for ‘village’. The party mistakenly thought the name of the country was “Kanata” or Canada.

(source: Wikipedia.com)

There are couple of other theories about where it originated from. Most accepted theory is that it came from word ‘Kanata’ of Iroquois Language of First Nation People. As mentioned above, ‘Kanata’ means dwellings, settlement or Village.
Another theory is that the name originated when Spanish or Portuguese explorers, having explored the northern part of the continent and unable to find gold and silver, wrote acá nada, or cá nada, (“nothing here”) on that part of their maps.