The language was originally called Occidental, as its vocabulary was based wholly on the major Western (Occidental) languages. Edgar von Wahl sought to utilise the international vocabulary that already existed as much as possible, but without the irregularities of the existing languages. This, he hoped, would make the language very easy to learn.

After the Second World War, the language was renamed Interlingue as the name Occidental was not popular in the communist countries of Eastern Europe, where some suspected that users of the language might have counter-revolutionary tendencies.