One wonders how many inhabited planets in the universe are referred to by the locals as "Dirt."
this post was submitted on 11 Dec 2025
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Fun fact: copper got its roman name because the main exporter of that good in ye classic times was the island of Cyprus (Kyprus, cuprum)
Yer da sells Avon.
Fun fact: Celts were originally central European, but the British Isles and Brittany were the only places Celtic culture survived the Romans.
that's not fun, that's horrifying
Some Celts drowned when doggerland became dogger island then dogger bank as the glaciers retreated. The sea flooding all the land must have been a surprise for them, no high land was high enough
That was a few thousand years before Celts were around.
Edit: It was also pretty slow; it was a couple of hundred miles across and took three thousand years to disappear, so it's on the order of a few miles in a lifetime.
Naming my main character "Alexander" and every time I visit a city I tell the DM to refer to it as "Alexandria" going forward.
People naming things in Australia:
- Townsville
- Western Australia
- Shark bay
- Great Sandy Desert
- Little Sandy Desert
- Snowy Mountains
But you also have wildcards:
- Tasmania (not actually a mental illness)
- Monkey Mia (There are no monkeys, and nobody named Mia)
- Lake disappointment (contains no water)
- Blue mountains (they are mostly green)
- King Island (we don't recognise its claim to the throne)
Tbf the blue mountains are blue from the right distance in the right weather, like most temperate Australian mountains
Lake disappointment (contains no water)
I don't know, that sounds like a pretty accurate name for a lake without water
- Shark bay
- Great Sandy Desert
- Little Sandy Desert
- Snowy Mountains
Lol these sound like Super Mario Bros levels
They'd probably go with Sandy Sandy Desert.
Didn't you cunts also name a swimming pool after your prime minister who died swimming in the ocean?
We did indeed. The Harold Holt memorial pool
Classic!
Lake disappointment (contains no water)
Well, that would be very disappointing if your lake had no water. So I think they nailed that one.
What's wrong with Shark Bay? I'd name every second bay I find, Shark Bay.
- Greater shark Bay
- Lesser shark Bay
- Disappointment shark Bay ( no sharks)
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Fantasy world names: scadrial, Pallimustus, Vulcan, Tatoine
Real planet names by locals: Dirt
It was called "Earth" because we needed to distinguish it from Sky and Water, which were totally different things.
But then the fire nation attacked
Reminds of the old story that I heard (unsure if it's true or not) about Torpenhow Hill in the UK.
Over centuries... various invaders and conquerors had come to that place and asked what it was called... First it was called Tor later on invaders added the word 'Pen' which was their word for Hill... later, more invaders came along and added the suffix 'How' which was their word for Hill.... and finally... it was named in more modern English as Torpenhow Hill.... which literally translates as Hill, Hill, Hill, Hill.
I don;t know if that's 100% true or not... but it's an amusing little story and given the oddities of the English language... I'd like to think it was.
Especially given there's a species of bear out there that's name is literally translated as Bear, Bear, Bear.
From the Wikipedia page:
A. D. Mills in his Dictionary of English Place-Names interprets the name as "Ridge of the hill with a rocky peak", giving its etymology as Old English torr, Celtic *penn, and Old English hoh, each of which mean 'hill'. Thus, the name Torpenhow Hill could be interpreted as 'hill-hill-hill Hill'.
I think it's a hill?
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There is an urban legend that when the Swedish map makers came to Finland the locals would mess with them when asked what a pace was called and that is why so many place names have “vittu” or “perse” etc. in them.
Also they named Turku just Åbo.
Åbo.
Swedish "å" is an entire word meaning;
a river, a creek, a big stream
"Bo"
bo n
**a dwelling** (of an animal), especially a bird's nest
fågelbo
bird’s nest
att bygga bo
to build a nest / to nest ("build nest" – idiomatic phrasing)
(poetic, extended from sense 1) **a home**
sätta bo
settle down
So it's a three letter word basically saying river-dwelling
I think rather than ask Finns what a place was named they just named them themselves. Perhaps because they were tired of the locals calling everything shit and piss. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Reminds me of
Torpenhow Hill is a hill in Cumbria, England. Its name consists of the Old English ‘Tor’, the Welsh ‘Pen’, and the Danish ‘How’ - all of which translate to modern English as ‘Hill’. Therefore, Torpenhow Hill would translate as hill-hill-hill hill
Here is a Tom Scott video about it:
https://youtu.be/NUyXiiIGDTo
https://invidious.f5.si/watch?v=NUyXiiIGDTo
I believe there's also a Haversham Hill, which is also a hill hill hill hill
My d&d game tends to work better when I just name things like “The Nightmare Wood” and “The Old Hills”. The simplicity somehow lands harder.
My friends don't know anything about my hometown, so I just name everything after old street names or old parts of town.
- Cabbageford
- Countsclearing
- Blackstakes
- Turnpike
- Holyspring
- Stepsstream
- Canyard
- Cattlestream Valley
- On The Height
- Cottageville
- Stalkpond
- Firecreek
- Meadowsmill
- Sticks
- Bogbrook
- Bogbridge
- Kingsroad
- Goldenworth
It feels incredibly realistic, because it is.
Sometimes name it after a person, or some shit that went down there, especially if its not someplace important. Like its not the nightmare town, there's nothing particular about it. So it's susanstown, and attempts to discover local lore would find stories about the ancient founder that have been embellished over the years.
or invert it.. Nightmare Town is named because the founder had a nightmare the first night after establishing camp there, and nothing else. Susan's Hamlet, though had some real fucked up shit happen, is actively haunted and is the birthplace of the BBEG.
Derekshithispantsthereville
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Half the smaller villages in southern Germany are named "Ried" which comes from reed and roughly means "swampy place". The other half uses some variation of the suffix "-höfen" which just means "this place consists of farms" 😂
If only I had the self-confidence of the guy who went to Australia and said "this place is called New South Wales now."
Pffft, he was plagued with self doubt compared to Cecil Rhodes who went to Africa and said "this place is called Rhodesia now."
I always wanted to be a fly on the wall when they named the colony (later state) of Virginia.
"We should name this place after Queen Elizabeth."
"Excellent idea, Elizabethia it is!"
"No, no. Virginia. 'Cause she's never... you know. Wink wink, nudge nudge."
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In my group if the GM can't pronounce the name in one try in a way that makes it clear to us how to spell it the players with rename it something more like "Bonertown" or just "Dave"
Fun fact in hungary there are no two towns with the same name. Or at least thats what everyone seems to say and to be fair i havent found a single pair yet so im pretty sure its true. Quite a neat thing actually, if you tell the name of even a small town to someone, they should be able to find it. And because hungarian has its unique characters and structures its quite likely that its the only place on earth named that.
Istanbul is literally "to the city" or in a way just "the city"
Beijing is "northern capital", Tokyo is "eastern capital", and Kyoto is "capital capital".
"capital_capital_final_thistime.jpg"
(Karl Marx's revision history)
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