place names

The study of the early forms of present place names may indicate the culture which gave the name together with the characteristics of the site. For example, ey meaning a dry point and ley meaning a forest, wood, glade, or clearing appear in many place names such as Chelsea and Henley-in-Arden. Place names are used as evidence for the dating of a settlement from which a chronology of settlements may be devised. There are pitfalls; ham can mean either village or water-meadow, for example.

Place names label, define, and represent places and people—see Alderman, Area 35, for a discussion on the use of Martin Luther King Jr's name. Under colonialism, places were renamed, and while many pre-colonial names were restored after independence, scores have been irretrievably lost. Extensive renaming took place as a political project shortly after the formation of the Soviet Union. (For the most part, by popular vote, the pre-revolutionary names have been re-established, but some of the resonances have been lost; the meanings attached to the ‘Leningrad Siege’ (1941-3) do not survive the change to the ‘St Petersburg Siege’.)

In other cases, new names have been coined; as official commemorations (Lennon Airport), or as part of state formation. Recordings still exist of a calypso written to educate and unite a disparate but newly created nation: ‘Ghana, Ghana is the name…’.

place-names in Ireland reflect human life on the island for at least 2, 000 years. The Gaelic name of the country, Éire (earlier Ériú > Ireland), may have been taken over by the Érainn from the Picts, whose own name (Latin Pretani > Pretanic, or British, Isles) is reflected in local names such as Ráth Cruithne (‘mound of the Picts’), now Crown Mound, Co. Down. The names of many of the early Celtic tribes survive in regional names such as Ulster (Cúige Uladh, ‘the fifth of the Ulaid’) and Corcaguiny (Corca Dhuibhne, ‘the seed of Duibhne’). The vast majority of the names originate in the Irish language. The Vikings left a small number of Norse names mainly on the coast (e.g. Carlingford, Waterford). The French-speaking Normans, while greatly influencing the Irish language, left just a few French names (e.g. Carton). The English likewise introduced very few new place-names, mostly coinages imposed by the later landlords enshrining their own family name (e.g. Manorhamilton).