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Dear Mavis Enderby...

March HareMarch Hare Shipmate
in The Circus
I've always been intrigued by place-names that could also be personal names. England, in particular, has a profusion of villages with double-barreled names, so it's not surprising that it occasionally throws up a Peter Tavy or a Stanley Pontlarge. But does the same thing happen in other countries and in other languages?

Examples, please - English, Welsh, French, German or whatever!

Comments

  • HeavenlyannieHeavenlyannie Shipmate
    edited June 22
    There’s several south of York - Kirk Smeaton, and the brothers Askham Bryan and Askham Richard.
    (I’m guessing Kirk is a common one though)
  • SandemaniacSandemaniac Shipmate
    At least one is just plain... well, you decide precisely what Wilsford Cum Lake is, I couldn't possibly comment!
  • FirenzeFirenze Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    There are a good number of really annoying individuals in Ireland - Ballyrobert, Ballymartin, Ballyclare, Ballyjamesduff...
  • sionisaissionisais Shipmate
    Firenze wrote: »
    There are a good number of really annoying individuals in Ireland - Ballyrobert, Ballymartin, Ballyclare, Ballyjamesduff...

    The currency isn’t well regarded either, as Ballymoney shows (yes I know it’s not a person).

    Lincolnshire has many place names of this kind, such as Norton Disney (I believe there is some connection to Walt), and Boothby Graffoe is a village in addition to a standup comedian.

  • TurquoiseTasticTurquoiseTastic Kerygmania Host
    Firenze wrote: »
    There are a good number of really annoying individuals in Ireland - Ballyrobert, Ballymartin, Ballyclare, Ballyjamesduff...

    My father used to tell me this one:

    "If Ballyrobert hadn't been so Ballymena bout his Ballymoney
    He could have had a Ballycastle for his Ballyhome..."
  • HeavenlyannieHeavenlyannie Shipmate
    Dale Gill resides in Lake District, alongside many other Dales.
  • Stercus TauriStercus Tauri Shipmate
    The US state of Pennsylvania has some good names. I particularly like King of Prussia and Jim Thorpe.
  • TheOrganistTheOrganist Shipmate
    What about Ashby De-la-Zouche - sounds like a TikTok influencer to my ears
  • Gill HGill H Shipmate
    It works the other way too. I remember a joke about the singer from A-ha, Morton Harket, speculating that he went on to win Best Kept Village in Dorset.
  • March HareMarch Hare Shipmate
    Please see the original post! This is not just about 'quirky place-names', or 'place-names which tickle our fancy', but specifically place-names that could double as personal names. So one-word place-names are ruled out from the start, and two- or three-word place-names must be in the form of (recognisable) Christian name followed by plausible surname.
    So far, only @Heavenlyannie has risen to the challenge (though I like @GH's inversion)!
  • SipechSipech Shipmate
    There's a village in south Oxfordshire called Charney Bassett, who could be a character from a PG Wodehouse story.
  • RockyRogerRockyRoger Shipmate
    Mrs RR and I live in a village called Offord Darcy, a character in a Jane Austen novel.
  • RoseofsharonRoseofsharon Shipmate
    Does there have to be a 'surname' to fit the brief?
    If not, I am surprised that Heavenlyannie hasn't offered Wendy, a hamlet in Cambridgeshire, a few miles from the town of Royston - which is also a given name.
  • FirenzeFirenze Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    The Celtic countries haven't much of a chance in this game since our placenames aren't in English.

    Something that didn't actually strike me until I left Ireland.
  • A Feminine ForceA Feminine Force Shipmate
    I've always been kind of partial to the American place names like Scranton Wilkes-Barre and Fuquay Varina.

    AFF
  • jrwjrw Shipmate
    I wasn't sure whether to start a reverse thread for this, but am I the only one who felt sure there must be a town (probably south of London, round that way) called Stockard Channing.
  • TheOrganistTheOrganist Shipmate
    I've always had the nagging feeling that Taylor Swift sounds like a ladies bicycle from the 1960s.
  • TheOrganistTheOrganist Shipmate
    ... and of course, there was the uncomfortable skin disease that was Vitas Gerulaitis 😅
  • RoseofsharonRoseofsharon Shipmate
    Have been casting my mind back to our time in NW Essex, before the children came along, and we spent weekends and summer evenings driving around looking for nice places to eat.
    We found plenty of oddly named hamlets, villages & towns, some of which fit the bill for this thread - the nearest being Saffron Walden and Margaret Roding
  • Tree BeeTree Bee Shipmate
    My Mum lives in a village called Saham Toney. Works better backwards.
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    There's a village in Essex called Margaretting. I wonder if it means "cosplaying a late, not much lamented Prime Minister"?

    (I don't think it does; I think the "ing" bit just means a village or settlement).

    Re: the OP, there was quite a celebrated road sign which read:

    To Old Bolingbroke and Mavis Enderby

    to which someone had added:

    the gift of a son :mrgreen:
  • PigletPiglet All Saints Host, Circus Host
    Sorry for the double post, but it's just occurred to me that in Scotland we've got John O'Groats and Kyle of Lochalsh ...
  • Amanda B ReckondwythAmanda B Reckondwyth Shipmate
    New York State has Paul Smiths, named after the founder of one of the first resort hotels in the Adirondack Mountains.

    The town of Paul Smiths was the last place in the United States to convert from crank phones, where you turned the crank to get the operator, to dial phones. This happened as late as 1970, I believe.
  • RoseofsharonRoseofsharon Shipmate
    As well as the two places I mentioned earlier there seem to be several members of the Green family located in the areas mr RoS and I used to frequent.
    Perry Green
    Shaw Green
    Skye Green
    and their French cousin, Gaston Green
  • TheOrganistTheOrganist Shipmate
    Then there's the faithful old retainer Old Sarum
  • KarlLBKarlLB Shipmate
    Tangentially, Mavis Enderby is defined in the Meaning of Liff as an almost forgotten ex-girlfriend of whom your wife is nevertheless inexplicably jealous.
  • MarsupialMarsupial Shipmate
    Milton Keynes sounds like a place someone was trying to name after an economist but they couldn’t decide which.
  • TheOrganistTheOrganist Shipmate
    We shouldn't forget Bradley Stoke on the outskirts of Bristol.
  • Stercus TauriStercus Tauri Shipmate
    There's the curiously named Maggieknockater up near @Cathscats territory, though really only a single word.
  • Amanda B ReckondwythAmanda B Reckondwyth Shipmate
    Chevy Chase, Maryland.
  • RoseofsharonRoseofsharon Shipmate
    My mention of Perry Green yesterday took me back even further, to childhood and teen years in Birmingham, where Perry is the first word in the name of three districts -
    Perry Barr
    Perry Beeches
    and Perry Common

    Perry Barr, of course, famously features in a popular carol -
    'We three kings of Orient are, one in a taxi, one in a car.
    One on a scooter, bipping his hooter,
    Going to Perry Barr'
  • TheOrganistTheOrganist Shipmate
    edited June 24
    Cumbria has Maryport
    And of course there is the famous Welsh lounge singer Tonypandy
  • Schroedingers CatSchroedingers Cat Shipmate
    Near us we do have Colney Heath, Potters Crouch, Bricket Wood and Nash Mills, all of whom could be people.

    Of course the real problem is that many places are named after people. And many surnames are taken from places. So yes, there is liable to be a crossover.

    Interestingly, Ashby-de-la-Zouch used to be just Ashby, but was renamed by someone who build his big house there called Lord de-la-Zouch.

    These Normans, coming over here, renaming out towns....
  • PriscillaPriscilla Shipmate
    Newton Abbott
  • TheOrganistTheOrganist Shipmate
    I'm amazed none of our Caledonian shippies have mentioned Newton Stewart
  • sionisaissionisais Shipmate
    Thornton Cleverleys, an old-school actor laddie, forever trying too hard with the juveniles.
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