In real life nords are people from Norway. So why do the Nords in elder scrolls have the same name if Norway doesn't even exist?

Not just Norway but all of Scandinavia.
Nord means "north" and there from Northern Tamriel/Skyrim
Therefor called Nords.

I guess the same reason everyone seems to speak English when there's no England, and why almost everything in the game is named after some Earth counterpart. I guess the racial name Nord is a holdover from the Arena days, where everything was heavily borrowed from DnD typical fantasy scenarios, and while other races such as Wood Elves have been fleshed out and given proper racial names, Nords remain Nords.

I wouldn't worry too much about it. We have other things completely out of context such as the Katana. Why is it called a Katana? Isn't that a word from Japan? And yet it's called a Katana. Hell, why is a sword called a sword? I'm sure the devs intend the word "Nord" to have some alternative meaning in the context of Tamriel but I don't know what it is yet. Maybe their history will be fleshed out more in an upcoming game. I do know that humanity originated on Atmora...and it's not hard to imagine the word "Atmoran" evolving into "Nord" over several thousand years. Just look at how language evolves on our own world.

I consider the game being in English as the translation of the local language. Still, that's one reason I loved all the Daedric Script text in Morrowind - on the banners, on the walls, all over the place! One of these days I'll learn how to read it.

As for katana - I agree. Probably something that was not well-thought out when introduced into the game.

http://www.imperial-library.info/dogate/es_weaseling.shtml:

Right, sure, like I'm totally convinced... :rolleyes:

Nord: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nord

Nord may refer to:

Places:

* Nord, California, an unincorporated community in Butte County, California
* Nord (French department), a department in northern France
* Nord Department (Haiti), a department in northern Haiti
* Nord, Greenland, a military and scientific base
* Nord Region, Burkina Faso
* Nord Region, Cameroon
* Nordic countries

Other uses:

* Nord (album), a 2001 album by Slovenian rock band Siddharta
* Nord Aviation, a former state-owned French aircraft manufacturer
* Nord (Clavia), a series of keyboards made by Clavia
* Nord (1991 film), a film directed by Xavier Beauvois with Bulle Ogier
* Nord (2009 film), a Norwegian film directed by Rune Denstad Langlo
* 12501 Nord, an asteroid
* 6th SS Mountain Division Nord, a WaffenSS division in WW2
* Gare du Nord, Paris railway station
* People of Norway

NORD may refer to:

* National Organization for Rare Disorders
* New Orleans Recreation Department
* Regional District of North Okanagan (North Okanagan Regional District or NORD), south-central British Columbia, Canada

To be fair, though, one might be able to assume that this is a case of http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/TranslationConvention, while the characters aren't really speaking English, it's rendered in English (Or whatever language the game is translated into in localized versions.) likewise, one wonders if a katana is actually called a katana, or if it's just called that in the games so players will no what it's supposed to be.

In any case, it's not any more out of place than an animal in the game being called a "wolf" or a "bear" or having monsters with names taken from real world mythology or having characters with names that sound like they come from a real world culture. The only difference is that the word or name in question comes from Japanese instead of the languages those other ones mentioned come from.

In any case, as has been said, the name "Nords" likely comes from the generic fantasy origins of the Elder Scrolls, let's face it, at the start, Bethesda wasn't exactly extremely creative with names, we have Redguards, Bretons, something-elves, about the only races in Arena that actually had original names were Khajiit and Argonians, later, we were given the proper names for elves (Dunmer, Bosmer, and things like that.) which were somewhat more creative than their western names, and the origins of "Redguard" turned out to bwe a bit more complicated than someone just combining the words "Red" and "Guard", though Nord doesn't seem to have gotten such a handwave yet.

Because it isn't called English ingame

The Ayleids noticed these men came from the north, so they called them nords. The Falmer would never call them nords, for to them, the distinction would imply these humans were somehow from Ehlnofey/Aldmeris (pure blasphemy). When the nedes stole the language of their Ayleid masters, they continued the use of that name. I doubt Nord was a name the Nords chose themselves.

That makes sense too.

So we have two possible evolved words. It's either Atmoran or Nord (Ayleid). The second one seems much more likely but leaves room for the possibility of my idea too.

Probably "Nord".

"Atmoran" would have go to through more changes.

I could imagine it going to Moran, then Morn or Mord, and finally Nord. For all we know the Nords still call themselves Atmorans or simply Men of Atmora. It could be similar to how Orsimer call themselves "Orcs" in the games. It's kind of acknowledging the common name for them, perhaps sarcastically and perhaps as a sort of reluctant acceptance,but among themselves they use the other word.

this obiviosly has nothing to do with the true meaning of nord....

Perhaps the Falmeri had sailed north to Atmora and named it Nord among themselves. When the Nords came, they put two and two together.

"Men from the North" in real languages underwent several manglings, becoming Normans and Nords and such. In TES, it could be:

"Men from the North (Atmora)"
"North Men (Became Normans in RL)"

That's where the real things stop. Let's now make the leap in logic that perhaps "North men" in a heavy accent, either Falmeri or Ayleidic (Difficult because we don't know what such accents would be) sounds like something else that means something completely different. That non-word was then changed and shortened to mean something else, just like the Amazon's name for themselves sounded more-or-less like the Greek phrase for "wthout briast" by coincidence, and then the name stuck. Whatever they came up with wound up becoming "Nord" and sticking.

Of course, if Nords are given the same treatment that Morrowind gave to Dunmer (who were previously just crotchety grey-skinned fogeys from a wasteland) then we will likely know for sure.

Nord = North

It was make sense if they just wanted to establish the Nords as "people from the north aka Skyrim". One should also remember that not all sources cite that Nords came from Atmora. Also, if people are speaking in "imperial", they are actually speaking in Aldmeri/Altmeri.

You're right, others call it Sarthaal and Altmora. One should also remember tes sources are mostly always contrary to one another.

I'm sad that we Swedes was left out in his statement. -.-

Other then that it's not more to say then what have already been said.