Why are the counties in USA called counties?

by tramaan

With the founding fathers being big on equality and eradicating of all titles of nobility, it is weird that they decided to keep the name "county" for local administrative areas.

GTFErinyes

With the founding fathers being big on equality and eradicating of all titles of nobility, it is weird that they decided to keep the name "county" for local administrative areas.

I wouldn't go so far as to say that they are big on equality and eradicating all titles of nobility - most of the founding fathers were landed gentry. They wanted to eliminate inherited nobility, sure, but that didn't mean they'd completely eradicate/revolutionize wording

As to your question, sure the term county came from feudal nobility, but it was also a legal subdivision of government that already existed within the colonies that didn't have to do with feudal counts or nobility, so it was just a continuation of colonial government.

This continuity is seen in a lot of examples after all. Louisiana, for instance, calls its counties parishes, Virginia still calls itself the Commonwealth of Virginia, New England is still called New England despite not being a part of the British Empire anymore, etc.