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This article is grossly misnamed. It is actually a list of place name suffix definitions, not place name origins. The latter would be a list of explanations of proper nouns, telling us what Michigan and Paris mean. --Kaz 15:40, 17 August 2006 (UTC)[reply]

True. It is also supposed to be about the United Kingdom but as yet does not mention Goidelic elements, which are the most common in Scotland and N. Ireland. I have renamed the 'Celtic' list to 'Brythonic'. Oaken 19:39, 19 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Celtic origins

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It seems that several of the words listed as of Celtic origin are previously from Latin - e.g. capel and castell for starters. Sources seem to agree that very few Celtic words have survived. I think this section needs to be overhauled.TobyJ 21:21, 29 October 2006 (UTC)[reply]

'Castell' and 'capel' are Welsh words of Latin origin, just as 'castle' and 'chapel' are English words with the same origin (via French). 'Castell Coch' is a Welsh/Celtic name (meaning 'red castle') in the same way as 'Newcastle' is English.
Celtic settlement names are rare in England (except in a few pockets) but in Scotland, Wales, Ireland, and Cornwall they predominate. Oaken 19:39, 19 January 2007 (UTC)[reply]


United States

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And what about horn isn't that viking too? jmushorn@yahoo.com

(moved from article to discussion by nl:CuoreGR)

kinds of elements

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In the name Bradley ('broad field'), or better yet Newton, is the first element a personal name (or pre-existing name of natural features), a natural feature, or a settlement function? —Tamfang (talk) 06:30, 10 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'd say they are neither (as I suspect you are hinting at), they are adjectives which qualify a noun (in those case, a settlement function). So should adjectives be listed as a type of place name element? Personally, I don't think so, because they are part of a noun phrase; they explicitly belong to the noun in question, and couldn't form part of a place name without the noun. I will attempt to make this clearer in the text! MinisterForBadTimes (talk) 07:45, 11 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Until the colonial boom in naming places for persons, personal names and adjectives were about equally likely to form placenames without head-nouns. —Tamfang (talk) 04:46, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I take your point that personal names rarely appear without noun in older place names. But in those instances, the implication is that "x belongs to y" - "y's x" (e.g. Beorn's ley/Barnsley). Thus in these place names, there are two seperate ideas; the person and the noun. An adjective, by definition, describes a noun, and therefore expresses the same idea as the noun.
So, to be a "type of place name element" as described in the text, I don't think there is a requirement to be able to form a place name in isolation; just to be able to express an seperate concept. There is also a pragmatic element to this - the breakdown of place name elements wasn't necessarily supposed to list everything that can feature in place names, just the major concepts that do. They are described as major place name elements, leaving plenty of scope for there to be other ones. MinisterForBadTimes (talk) 12:31, 14 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I like the new description of the place name elements. I think it solves a lot of the above problems without altering the general gist of things.MinisterForBadTimes (talk) 06:51, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Glad to hear it. —Tamfang (talk) 18:44, 15 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Place name origins in Britain and Ireland

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This section is over-long and should be replaced by a summary and links to British toponymy etc. Adresia (talk) 14:38, 27 April 2009 (UTC)[reply]

List of place name meanings in England

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Is there a list of place name meanings in England? If not it would be interesting to have a sortable list along the lines of:

Name origin position example Meaning Notes
ley Anglo-Saxon postfix Barnsley Clearing.[1] If there are a lot of places ending in ley in an area it is an indication that the area was forested in Anglo-Saxon times.[1]
pen Brittonic prefix Pencombe summit, promontory or hill, possibly tree.[2] "Names beginning with pen-—particularly distinctive because of the dearth of ps in Old English—are more problematic. Most of them are likely to be from Brittonic pen, 'summit, promontory' (on which see Padel 1985, s.v.),"[2]
wick Anglo-Saxon postfix Warwick Farm.[3]

What do others think?-- PBS (talk)

Like List of generic forms in place names in the United Kingdom and Ireland? —Tamfang (talk) 05:57, 7 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Yes! Thank you. I have placed alinked to in close to the start of the section Place name origins in Britain & Ireland -- PBS (talk) 08:45, 7 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]
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