The story
- Classical Nahuatl · derived fromChiapan
- Spanish · borrowed fromChiapa
- English todayChiapa
From Spanish Chiapa, from the local Chiapaneca people, from Chiapan + -eco (“-ic, -ish”): forming demonyms), from Classical Nahuatl Chiapan, from chia (“chia, oilseed”) + either -pan (“upon; place of; place of the”) or -apan (“river, stream”), presumably in reference to the Grijalva.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.