Toponymy

The sub-branch of cultural geography that studies the location, use, and origin of  place names. A toponym is the name used to identify a specific location on the landscape. An examination of place names in a region can provide a great deal of information about the cultural landscape, both past and present, and may provide clues regarding sequent occupance. The etymology of a place name may reveal much about those who imposed it. For example, migrants sometimes name their place of settlement after some characteristic of the “home” they left, maintaining a sense of a familiar place, although the actual physical setting may be far different than the original. Hermann, Missouri, for example, was founded by German immigrants in the 1800s, and is named for a German hero who defeated the Roman Empire. 

Lawrence, Kansas, was founded in the 1850s by abolitionists from Massachusetts, who named the new settlement after a famous anti-slavery Massachusetts politician, Amos Adams Lawrence, reinforcing the status of Kansas as a free state. The influence of Spanish culture and settlement in southern California is evident in place names such as San Louis Obispo, San Diego, and Santa Barbara, along with dozens more. Across the United States, the ubiquitous presence of Native American place names for towns, counties, major cities, and states themselves indicates the lasting cultural impact of the region’s original inhabitants. The specific language used in such naming indicates the home territory of individual groups—Tallahassee, Florida is derived from the language of the Muskogee people who lived in the region, while the name of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, comes from the Algonquin languages, spoken by several Native American groups who occupied the northern United States. 

The origin of many place names is not as obvious as the examples mentioned above. Toponyms typically have two components, a specific portion and a generic element. In the case of Cartersville, Georgia, “Carter” is the specific part of the name, while “ville” is the generic segment. The use of certain generic components is sometimes unique to specific languages and/or ethnic groups, and linguistic geographers can often trace the origins of migrants through an examination of these patterns. For example, the generic suffixes of boro, shire, and ford used for town names (Foxboro, Wiltshire, Milford) are typical of English and Scottish settlements in New England. These generic components of place names have been transplanted to other areas of the United States, usually by migrants from the northeast. A suffix of dorf or burg in a city place name often indicates settlement by German immigrants. Studies of toponyms can uncover cultural relict boundaries in the landscape, because the toponyms used by a people often persist on the landscape long after the group has disappeared or moved on, or new boundaries have been formed. Of course, a toponym may provide descriptive information about the physical characteristics of a place as well. The qualities of Death Valley, California, and Pleasant Valley, Iowa, are reflected in their respective toponyms, at least according to those who named them.