The Netherlands are named after a feature of the landscape, they are literally the "low countries". The people are named after their language, which was called Dietsc in Middle Dutch (Medieval Dutch). The word is related, as is the language, to Deutsch (the German word for German). Both Dietsc and Deutsch ultimately go back to the word "diet" which meant people. Therefore Dutch and Deutsch both mean "language of the people".

Funnily enough, in Dutch the language is called Nederlands these days. Dietsc or Dietsch fell out of use after the Middle Ages though it still survives in the set expression "diets maken" (to explain, to make clear), and it was revived by pan-Germanic nationalists and national-socialists in the thirties.

It is only English that has preserved the old name for the language and the people. All other European languages call Dutch, both the language and the people, something to do with the Netherlands and/or Holland: néerlandais (French), niederländisch (German), nizozemský/holandský ("of the low country" in Czech, and similar words in other Slavic languages), neerlandés/ollandés (Spanish, and similar words in other Romance languages), holländska (Swedish, and similar words in other Scandinavian languages), alankomaalainen (from "lowland", Finnish).