From Wiki:
Reflecting the treaty between the British and French governments that led to Concorde's construction, the name
Concorde is from the French word
concorde (IPA:
[kɔ̃kɔʁd]), which has an English equivalent,
concord. Both words mean
agreement,
harmony or
union. The name was officially changed to
Concord by
Harold Macmillan in response to a perceived slight by
Charles de Gaulle. At the French roll-out in
Toulouse in late 1967,
[37] the British Government
Minister for Technology,
Tony Benn, announced that he would change the spelling back to
Concorde.
[38] This created a nationalist uproar that died down when Benn stated that the suffixed "e" represented "Excellence, England, Europe and
Entente (Cordiale)". In his memoirs, he recounts a tale of a letter from an irate Scotsman claiming: "[Y]ou talk about 'E' for England, but part of it is made in Scotland." Given Scotland's contribution of providing the nose cone for the aircraft, Benn replied, "
t was also 'E' for 'Écosse' (the French name for Scotland) – and I might have added 'e' for extravagance and 'e' for escalation as well!"[39]