# English place names, why two? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 21, 2022, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450 "2022-03-21T23:48:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 12:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/21 "2022-03-22T12:15:30Z")
> [@bob\_2](#): > > New York, New York (so good they named it twice) confuses a lot of people over here. There’s York in Yorkshire and York in Lancashire, plus three New York’s in Britain (one each in Lincolnshire, North Yorkshire, and Tyne and Wear). None of them have a big statue of a lady out in their harbor, so I have certain small doubts that people get any of them confused with the New York in the rebelious colonies. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/22 "2022-03-22T12:24:12Z")
> [@Riemann](#): > > Indeed, so what we were actually talking about is rare. In the U.K., it’s almost unheard of to need to append the county in order to distinguish between two major _known_ places with identical names like Portland or Springfield in the U.S. I’ll back this up as well. Duplicate names are ten a penny, context normally suffices. Only on rare occasions is an additional place name appended. It is certainly far from the norm to the point where you’d furrow your brow were someone to speak in that way. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/23 "2022-03-22T12:34:29Z")
> [@bob\_2](#): > > New York, New York (so good they named it twice) confuses a lot of people over here. Heck, New York confuses me, here in the US. I gather that it has five boroughs, but I’ve never been sure what a borough is, or whether any other cities anywhere have them, or when to specify New York and when to specify Manhattan or Queens. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 12:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/24 "2022-03-22T12:55:30Z")
Wait til you learn about boroughitis > **[Boroughitis](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boroughitis)** > > Pages for logged out editors learn more > > > > > Boroughitis (also borough fever or borough mania) was the creation in the 1890s, usually by referendum, of large numbers of small boroughs in the U.S. state of New Jersey, particularly in Bergen County. Attempts by the New Jersey Legislature to reform local government and school systems led to the breakup of most of Bergen County's townships into small boroughs, which still balkanize the state's political map. This occurred following the devel... ---
**Author:** ![jjakucyk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3d9bf3/32.png) [@jjakucyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjakucyk)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/25 "2022-03-22T13:31:53Z")
The Tim Traveller makes some jokes about there being more than one Newcastle at 1:30 here: [![](https://img.youtube.com/vi/EySUjMspTl0/maxresdefault.jpg "Grand, Historic, and Never Used: Nottingham's Park Tunnel") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EySUjMspTl0) ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 3:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/26 "2022-03-22T15:46:28Z")
> [@bob\_2](#): > > New York, New York (so good they named it twice) confuses a lot of people over here. That’s a special case (and there are many special cases when it come to NYC. “New York, New York” isn’t really needed to distinguish between the city in the state of New York and a city of the same name in Britain. It’s one of the ways to distinguish between the city and the state - just “New York” can be either - of course, people also say “New York State” or “New York City” ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/27 "2022-03-22T15:48:06Z")
Just chipping in a reference to the Beatles song _A Day in the Life_ on the _Sergeant Pepper_ album, which mentions “Blackburn, Lancashire”. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/28 "2022-03-22T15:56:35Z")
There are boroughs in other places - but they are different from the ones in NYC. The ones in NYC are administrative divisions of the city which are each coextensive with a county which is a division of the state. ( and some of the counties have a different name that the borough - for example, Kings County is the same place as the Borough of Brooklyn). In other places in the US , boroughs are either municipalities or county-equivalents. ---
**Author:** ![Schnitte](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/schnitte/32/9033_2.png) [@Schnitte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Schnitte)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/29 "2022-03-22T16:04:25Z")
This is true, but to my knowledge the five counties that are coextensive with New York City boroughs exist only on paper; there is no county governance, there are no county officers (elected or otherwise), and no functions are carried out by those counties. The boroughs do have elected officers, but the functions they carry out are relatively minor compared to those at city level. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 4:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/30 "2022-03-22T16:38:19Z")
And in fact, it would be perfectly normal to subdivide the city like they did for Shard End- you could easily say, “Fifth Ward, Houston” or “Hollywood, Los Angeles” and people would probably know what you’re talking about. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/31 "2022-03-22T16:39:13Z")
There’s no county governance , but each county elects its own district attorney ( there is not a single one for the entire city) and their own judges for Supreme and Surrogate’s court (which are located in every county).So not entirely on paper - but that’s one of the special cases that apply to NYC . The counties and the city haven’t completely merged like in San Francisco , but neither is it an independent city, not part of any county. ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/32 "2022-03-22T16:39:17Z")
There seems to be some ambiguity about whether some actions are taken by the borough or the “County”, for example, the seal of the Brooklyn District Attorney ([http://www.brooklynda.org/](http://www.brooklynda.org/)) says “District Attorney Kings County” ---
**Author:** ![jjakucyk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3d9bf3/32.png) [@jjakucyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjakucyk)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/33 "2022-03-22T18:34:01Z")
It varies widely state by state. In Ohio, incorporated municipalities dissolve the township underneath them, but not the county. For example, Mill Creek and Spencer Township don’t exist in Hamilton County anymore, since they were all incorporated into Cincinnati. In Virginia all cities are independent of the county in which they reside, so they act like consolidated city/counties. There’s three other independent cities in the US: Baltimore, St. Louis, and Carson City, but they’re anomalies. In some states (especially in the northeast) townships are incorporated similarly to cities, with many more authoritative powers than townships or county governments farther to the west or south. Then there’s home rule, school districts, regional planning authorities, etc. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [March 22, 2022, 8:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/34 "2022-03-22T20:29:38Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > There are towns with the same names in the UK, so a county, region, river, island, etc has to be named to distinguish them. This, however, if you’re hearing people say things like Somethingtown, Somewhereshire, UK it’s most likely because you’re not a local, and the speaker is trying to give you meaningful context. I live in Hampshire which is 1,400 square miles in size. There are at least four places named ‘Newtown’ in this county, but nobody is likely to need to specify which one they mean in most informal contexts ---
**Author:** ![Mark\_Finn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/34f0e0/32.png) [@Mark\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mark_Finn)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2022, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/35 "2022-03-25T14:46:27Z")
And you also have the abbreviations for the UK counties - e.g. “Bucks” for “Buckinghamshire”, or “Notts” for “Nottinghamshire”. ---
**Author:** ![Filbert](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/filbert/32/3433_2.png) [@Filbert](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Filbert)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2022, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/36 "2022-03-25T15:02:07Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > Newport, Wales and Newport Isle of Wight There are (at least) 2 Newports in Wales actually - the big one in South Wales and a smaller one on the North coast. Like everyone else has said, there’s a lot of places named for features which are locally unusual but not nationally so, so names do get duplicated a lot, especially for smaller villages. In documents which are likely to be read by people not in the local area, it just makes sense to specify; even if most people aren’t going to be actually confused, some will automatically think of the nearby place. My old local parish newspaper would refer to ‘Burton’ without specifying which of the numerous villages with that name they meant, because it would be the one just a mile or so away, but there was another one only about 15 miles away… ---
**Author:** ![mbh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a6a055/32.png) [@mbh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mbh)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2022, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/37 "2022-03-25T15:11:16Z")
There are two towns in Scotland. One is in Shetland, the other is in Orkney. Both towns are named Twatt. I really, really, really want to see Queen Elizabeth raise someone to the House of Lords, with the magnificent title “Lord of the Twatts”. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2022, 4:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/38 "2022-03-25T16:00:39Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Heck, New York confuses me, here in the US. I gather that it has five boroughs, but I’ve never been sure what a borough is, or whether any other cities anywhere have them, or when to specify New York and when to specify Manhattan or Queens. It’s not really that hard to understand. In the late 19th century, the City of New York was expanded to annex all the surrounding municipalities, the result being that the city now covered what was five entire counties. For administrative purposes, each county also became an administrative division of the city, in this case called a borough. New York County - Manhattan Borough Kings County - Brooklyn Borough Queens County - Queens Borough The Bronx County - The Bronx Borough Richmond County - Staten Island Borough The postal situation is a bit more complicated. All addresses in Manhattan are New York, New York All addresses in Brooklyn are Brooklyn, New York All addresses in the Bronx are Bronx, New York All addresses in Staten Island are Staten Island, New York BUT Addresses in Queens are addressed to individual postal addresses, mostly based on the cities and villages that existed before Queens was incorporated into New York City, like “Flushing, New York” Whether you call a place in New York City “New York” when you are referring to it, or something else, depends upon context. ---
**Author:** ![Banksiaman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/banksiaman/32/3334_2.png) [@Banksiaman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Banksiaman)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2022, 9:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/39 "2022-03-25T21:41:21Z")
Do they still use Salop for Shropshire in any current usage? ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [March 25, 2022, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450/40 "2022-03-25T23:59:31Z")
No doubt people still use it as an address, just as I use WORCS for Worcestershire and my daughter uses HANTS for Hampshire. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/english-place-names-why-two/961450.md?page=3)