Astana became the capital of the Central Asian country of Kazakhstan in 1997. But if you’re looking for Astana on a map today, you won’t find it. The city was renamed Nur-Sultan in 2019, after the country’s first democratically elected president, Nursultan Nazarbayev. After his resignation in 2019, the country’s succeeding president, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, announced that the country’s capital would be renamed in his honor following a unanimous vote in Kazakhstan's parliament.

The earliest inhabitants of Ottawa, Canada’s capital, were the Algonquin peoples, who were well-known fur traders. The name Ottawa itself comes from an Algonquin word meaning “to trade.” It’s a befitting name for the city, considering its strategic location on the banks of the Ottawa River, the principal tributary to the St. Lawrence River, which connects the Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean.

While Johannesburg is the largest city in South Africa, it is not home to any of the federal branches of government, denying it capital status. South Africa has three capitals that house branches of its federal government. Pretoria, in the north, is the home of the executive branch; the legislative branch lives in the southwestern city of Cape Town; and the members of the judicial branch reside in the central city of Bloemfontein.

Chosen for its geographically central location, planned throughout the latter half of the 1950s, and officially founded on April 21, 1960, Brazil's current capital city was designed by architect Oscar Niemeyer, who looked to the sky for inspiration. According to his vision, the city's bureaucrats would reside in the wings and work in the fuselage. And if you look at the city today from above, it does indeed resemble an airplane.

Vietnam’s capital, Hanoi, was founded on the banks of the Red River in 1010. It is said that Ly Thai To, the then-Vietnamese king, spotted a dragon soaring over the river, which is why he chose to build upon its river banks. The modern city is dotted with tributaries and lakes, and was appropriately named Hanoi, which translates to “inside rivers,” in 1831.

The Mongolian capital city of Ulaanbaatar has an average annual temperature of just 28 degrees Fahrenheit — and winter temperatures can reach as low as -40 degrees! The city’s geography has much to do with its bone-chilling averages — it’s located far inland away from the ocean and at a high altitude of 4,430 feet.

Switzerland is one of a handful of countries that claims no official capital. Its seat of government can be found in Bern, and for that reason, Bern is often called the Federal City. When Switzerland’s cantons (regions) decided to create a federal constitution in 1848, it was agreed that the new country would have no official capital in order to not be seen as elevating any one canton above another.

Bangkok is home to a massive network of waterways that inspire the city’s nickname, “the Venice of the East.” The Thai capital’s first canals — known as khlongs — were primarily dug as protective moats. Later, they were used for irrigation, drainage, and transportation. Some of Bangkok’s khlongs have since been paved over to make way for motorized roadways, but many residents still traverse the city via the extensive waterways on motorized boats today.

Slovakia’s capital of Bratislava is bordered to the west by Austria (whose capital of Vienna is less than 50 miles away) and to the south by Hungary. It is the only national capital that borders two foreign countries. Bratislava is the largest city in Slovakia but one of the smallest national capitals in Europe, home to only around 440,000 people.

More than one million people live in El Salvador’s capital of San Salvador. The city lies just below the slopes of the San Salvador volcano, for which it is named, and translates to “Holy Savior.” El Salvador is the smallest country by land area in Central America and is about the size of New Jersey.

Although Sucre is the official legal capital of Bolivia, the country's actual seat of government is in La Paz, which makes it the country’s de facto capital. Both cities lie in the highlands of the Andes mountains and are among the highest cities in the world, with altitudes of 9,219 feet and 11,913 feet above sea level, respectively.

Denmark’s capital of Copenhagen is located on the coastal islands of Zealand and Amager, at the southern end of Øresund (“The Sound”), which forms the Danish-Swedish border. Founded as a Viking fishing village in the 10th century, Copenhagen became the capital of Denmark in 1445. The island of Zealand actually lent its name to another country across several ponds: New Zealand.

The First Continental Congress met in Philadelphia in 1774 to discuss America's independence from Britain. The government moved several times in the following years, to Princeton, New Jersey; Annapolis, Maryland; Trenton, New Jersey; and New York, New York. Washington, D.C. was finally designated as the nation's permanent capital in 1800.

Vatican City — the world's smallest independent nation-state — is fully contained within the city of Rome, Italy's capital. Covering just 0.17 square miles, the Vatican has been recognized as its own sovereign state since 1929, though Rome's history extends back more than two millennia to the days of the Roman Empire.

Reykjavik is located in southwestern Iceland and is the hub of the country's economic and cultural life. It sits just below the Arctic Circle at a latitude of approximately 64 degrees north of the equator, making it the world’s northernmost capital of a sovereign state. Moscow, Russia, which sits at 55 degrees north, is the second-northernmost capital.

Argentina's capital city is Buenos Aires, which translates to "fair winds" or "good airs" in Spanish. According to legend, the Spanish sailor who established the first port of Buenos Aires in the 16th century gave it its name because it was far enough south to avoid a strain of marshland mosquitoes. The mosquitoes carried malaria, whose name is derived from "mal aire" or "bad air," so without them, the city had "good airs."

The humble lima bean is one of the oldest beans on the South American continent, where it has been cultivated for more than 7,000 years. That it shares its name with Peru’s capital is no coincidence: The lima bean was named after the city where Spanish colonizers first encountered it during Incan rule in the 16th century. The Spanish introduced the bean to Europe and the Americas, where it quickly spread in popularity.

Despite being the Finnish capital, Helsinki was actually founded by Swedish King Gustavus Vasa in 1550 as a Baltic seaport. After Russia conquered Finland in 1809, Helsinki became the capital of the autonomous Grand Duchy of Finland. Finally, when Finland became independent in 1917, the city became the new country's capital.

Legend says that when the Greeks founded their capital, two gods fought over the chance to become the city’s patron. Athena, the goddess of wisdom, gifted the people with olive trees, while Poseidon, the sea god, gave them the Tiber river. In the end, the Greeks chose Athena, calling their city Athens in her honor.

Japan's coastal capital has come a long way from its days as a fishing village, when it was originally named Edo. The greater Tokyo metropolitan area is home to approximately 37.4 million people, more than any other metro area on the planet. About one-quarter of Japan's population lives there.