[toyg]

It is the word the Chinese would like non-Chinese to use when talking about the city. It’s a classic example of modern cultural re-appropriation, because Peking was the widely-accepted transliteration - until attitudes (and power) changed and the Chinese asked the world to use Beijing instead. It wouldn’t be particularly far-fetched to imagine Turks might also ask the world, eventually, to use their own spelling to refer to the country - especially considering the unfortunate overlap of the word “turkey” in English.

[trepanne]

> Peking was the widely-accepted transliteration - until attitudes (and power) changed and the Chinese asked the world to use Beijing instead.

An interesting exception is [Peking University](http://english.pku.edu.cn/) which elected (and was permitted) to retain its venerable Romanized style.

[gsich]

Still "Peking" in german.

[Freak_NL]

Interesting, even the German newspapers still use Peking.

The shift to Beijing did happen in Dutch, without too much fuss. Peking is now only used for the duck recipe (Pekingeend).

Odd really, because Beijing is kind of unique in this aspect. For most capitals the Dutch name is consequently used (Berlijn/Parijs vs. Berlin/Paris).

[realusername]

Same in France, it's still "Pékin", I suspect Beijing will never take off since it's harder to pronounce.

[johnchristopher]

You could spell it "Beijing" and keep pronouncing it "Pékin" :). I remember hearing "Bé-ying" and "Bé-jing" once on french radio/TV.