Geography, Environment, Sustainability (Mar 2016)
THE CITIES OF THE AMERICAS IN MODERN TIMES: A CASE STUDY ON TOPONYMY
Abstract
During the 19th and 20th centuries many Italian migrants set out for the Americas, where peoples from other European countries, such as Spain, Portugal, France, Germany, England, Ireland etc. had already established themselves. We have to make a distinctionbetween the migration typology of North and of South America. In North America the origin of the migrants was predominantly England and France, while in South America the first migrants were mainly Spanish and Portuguese. Different reasons should explain place names in the United States of America: (i) early presence of tribes and villages (a) Loan Translations, (b) Folk-etymologies; (c) Terms associated with Native American Culture and History, etc. (ii)place names referring to saints and religious sites, and names of distinguished persons (San Francisco, Washington respectively; (iii) the languages of the colonists and their place of origin (English, Spanish, French etc); (iv) classical and literary references (we can mention Athens in Georgia (a university city), Athens in Ohio(another university city); (v) mangling of European city names (in Maryland a patent was made out early as 1677 for a place to be called by the common English name Burleigh. Later it was spelled Berlin, although still accented on the first syllable); (vi) artificial assemblages (The name Losantville derives from L (Delaware-English Licking), os the Latin “mouth”, anti, the Greek άντί, in front of" and ville, the French town).
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