Language & WorldFact
Why Mexico is spelled with x but pronounced 'Meh-hee-ko'.
The name comes from Nahuatl 'Mēxihco', the land of the Mexica, the Aztecs. In 16th-century Spanish, 'x' stood for the sound 'sh'; it later shifted to the throaty 'h' now written 'j'. Spain therefore long wrote 'Méjico', while Mexico kept the historical x, which today represents that /x/ sound.
Useful: 'Texas' and 'Oaxaca' come from the same old x spelling.
Source: en.wikipedia.org