Re: OT: Place name constituents

Jim Henry wrote:
>
> One of the spiffiest bits of place-name conlangery is
> the name of a ford in _The Phoenix Guards_ by
> Steven Brust.  I can't cite it because my copy is loaned
> out; basically the aboriginals called it simply "ford"
> in their language, and each people who came along
> and grabbed the land after them took the previous name,
> perhaps mangled it to fit their own language's
> phonology, and added their own language's word
> for "ford".  I think the final name was something like
> "Bengloalafurd", but I suspect I'm misspelling it because
> this only gets on Ghit.

This kind of thing happens in the United States today.
For example, in the next town to me, a housing developer
put in a new street of houses. He had an affection for
Germany, so he named it Wald Strasse. Now the people
who live in that town refer to it as Wald Strasse Street.

--Ph. D.

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