Do you ever wish your city kept its original name?

[mrnyc]

its good and fine an old newspaper dropped the ‘a’ out of cleveland. sorry moses cleaveland.

[galleyfox]

Originally Posted by bilbao58

I always heard "Chicago" was the Anglicized version of the Gallicized version of the Native American word for smelly onions.

So basically it took the French to get from Shikakwa to Chicago.

There’s recently been some debate about that.

From Garcilaso de la Vega writing about the Hernando De Soto Expedition
Years 1539-1543:

“… a large river, which because it was the greatest of all those that our Spaniards saw in La Florida,[3] they called it the Rio Grande, without giving it any other name. Juan Coles [La Vega informant[4]] says in his Relation (i.e., report) that in the Indian language this river was called Chucagua, and below we shall describe its grandeur at more length, for it was a wonderful thing.”[5]



In 1670, the De Soto Spanish narrative gets translated into French

In 1677, La Salle makes a plan to explore the Mississippi, and in 1679 “Checagou” appears on a map of Illinois for the first time.

Henri Joutel arrives later in 1687, and is told by the Potawatomi that Chicago sounds like their slang word for ‘skunk-weed ’ although the proper Potawatomi name for garlic was wanissisia.




There’s a good chance that the word “Chicago” is another name for the Mississippi River that’s been transliterated from Chisca —> Spanish —> French —> Ojibwe— > English


According to Hennepin, Chicago was also known as Fort Creveceur at one time.

“An Account of the Building of a New Fort on the River of the Illinois Named by the Savages Che-cau-gou and by US Fort Creveceur.”

[sopas ej]

Originally Posted by badrunner

Do I wish LA was still called El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles?

No.

I like that Bangkok's name in Thai translates to "City of Angels" (Krung Thep Maha Nakhon). Somewhat oddly, Bangkok is not a sister city of Los Angeles, which has the only officially recognized Thai Town in the US, and LA County has the largest number of Thai people outside of Thailand.

[badrunner]

Originally Posted by sopas ej

I like that Bangkok's name in Thai translates to "City of Angels" (Krung Thep Maha Nakhon). Somewhat oddly, Bangkok is not a sister city of Los Angeles, which has the only officially recognized Thai Town in the US, and LA County has the largest number of Thai people outside of Thailand.

Ah I didn't know that about Bangkok. But I always thought it was one of the greatest city names ever

[tech12]

San Francisco used to be known as Yerba Buena, which means "good herb". Before that, there were several native American villages in what is now SF, the biggest of which were apparently: Amuctac, Sitlintac, Tubsinta, Petlenuc, and Chuchui.

Oakland/Berkeley/Emeryville/Albany/Alameda/San Leandro used to be a ranch named Rancho San Antonio (the San Antonio district in Oakland is named after it, and for a while was also known as Brooklyn before it was annexed by Oakland).

IMO all the names are pretty good. Would be cool to see more stuff named after native tribes though.

[muertecaza]

Originally Posted by Obadno

Stonewall? Yeah probably!

Phoenix is a weird name. Stonewall named after the wildly interesting Civil War General would be cool. current culturally melodramatic issues with it right now notwithstanding.

Before that the region was referred to as "Pima Villages" which of course was just the small and scattered native farming communities and families in the river basin where Phoenix now sits.

And before that I suppose it was some Hohokam name lost to history.

Other prior or proposed names for Phoenix include Swilling's Mill (after founder Jack Swilling), Helling Mill, Mill City, East Phoenix, and Salina. None of those have much of a ring for me. Salina, for the Salt River, is OK, but not better than Phoenix. I agree that Stonewall is a pretty badass name for a city, even apart from the Confederate associations. But I'd probably stick with Phoenix. It has a cool meaning and I'm a sucker for classical allusions.

The same settler, Darrell Duppa, is said to have suggested both Phoenix and Tempe. I love the idea of a high-minded Englishman roving across the Southwestern deserts giving places names of things he remembers from his time at Cambridge. Speaking of Tempe, its original name was Hayden's Ferry, which I quite like. But it seems more appropriate for a small waypoint. Tempe is more appropriate for the City it is today.

[jmecklenborg]

Originally Posted by Buckeye Native 001

Cincinnati used to be Losantaville and Fort Washington. Not sure if either would be an improvement?

To clarify, Cincinnati is named for the Society of the Cincinnati, which is itself named after Lucious Quinctius Cincinnatus.

Losantiville is an ugly word and would have caused endless confusion with nearby Louisville.

Louisville, St. Louis, and Louisiana are named after different French kings.

[Yuri]

São Paulo was founded in January 25th, 1554. It was St. Paul's Day, hence the name.

Its full name in the past was São Paulo de Piratininga, "Piratininga" is an indigenous word (Tupi-Guarani) meaning dry fish according to Google.

[dave8721]

Having Dallas, TX and Fort Dallas, FL (Miami's original US name) would have been interesting. Keeping the native name Tequesta, FL could have worked. Tequesta, FL is now a small city in Palm Beach County.

[craigs]

According to Wikipedia, Los Angeles was founded on the Tongva village of Yaanga, meaning "poison oak place." So, no--I think "Los Angeles" is a much better name for the city.

[KevinFromTexas]

I like the name Austin alright, and it's convenient living in an A-name city, but I will say that our original name of Waterloo just rolls off the tongue so much more satisfyingly.

[homebucket]

Oakland comes from the name encinal, which is Spanish for oak grove. There used to be oak trees all over downtown Oakland before it was developed. There's a high school in the neighboring city, Alameda called Encinal High. Notable alumni include Isaiah Rider, Willie Stargell, Jimmy Rollins, Dontrelle Willis, and John Wimberley.

[10023]

Londinium would sound a bit odd, but it didn’t change much. New York or New Amsterdam?

[Razor]

Originally Posted by montréaliste

Toronto and Chicago are cool names. I really like North American city names rooted in aboriginal culture.
.

Me too! Chicago for example, is my fave city name..NA Cities named after aboriginal North American references are the best IMO.

Ottawa used to be called "By-Town", named after colonel By.
I prefer the former..I'm not a fan of cities ending in "ville" of "field" myself either .They sound too generic. Geographic reference names like Detroit are cool, as long as they are in a different language other than English.."Bend", or "Little Rock" don't resonate with me personally. I like the city names endining in "apolis" as well. Minneapolis is a real cool name.

[harryc]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

considering the fact that "Fort Dearborn" is the only other possible name that Chicago might have assumed in the past, i'll say no.

"Fort X" city names are pretty bland and generic, and even if it had been truncated to just "Dearborn", that would have been dumb too.

"Chicago" is a wonderful and unique name. It doesn't get confused for any other place on the planet. And it's by far the largest city in the US with a native american-derived name ("shikakwa" meaning smelly onions).

so yeah, "Chicago" is a keeper of a name. I'm glad "Fort Dearborn" was left in the history books.

Same goes with Waukegan - don't think it ever had another name but if it did it was Little Fort .

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by montréaliste

Day-traw for the French, Detroyed for the English.

More like Day-trwah (with a French R) in French I'd say.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Razor

Me too! Chicago for example, is my fave city name..NA Cities named after aboriginal North American references are the best IMO.

Ottawa used to be called "By-Town", named after colonel By.
I prefer the former..I'm not a fan of cities ending in "ville" of "field" myself either .They sound too generic. Geographic reference names like Detroit are cool, as long as they are in a different language other than English.."Bend", or "Little Rock" don't resonate with me personally. I like the city names endining in "apolis" as well. Minneapolis is a real cool name.

Kitchissippi would have been a cool name for Ottawa. It is the Algonquin name for the Ottawa River that the city was built along and named for.

It means Great River and I'd agree that Kitchissippi sounds way better than that, and also better than Grande Rivière in French.

Interesting that in the mid 1800s Ottawa residents chose to change their city's name from the British-sounding Bytown to the Indigenous name Ottawa.

Things probably didn't often change in that direction in those days.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by Razor

Me too! Chicago for example, is my fave city name..NA Cities named after aboriginal North American references are the best IMO.

for as many states as we have with native american derived names, there aren't a ton of large US cities with such.



Cities with fully-derived native american names out of the 100 largest US cities:

Chicago
Seattle
Milwaukee
Tucson
Omaha
Miami
Wichita
Tampa
Honolulu
Chesapeake
Spokane



Cities with partially-derived native american names out of the 100 largest US cities:

Oklahoma City
Kansas City
Minneapolis

[(four 0 four)]

Terminus >>> Marthasville >>> Atlanta. I'm OK with the change...change is good.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by badrunner

Do I wish LA was still called El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora la Reina de los Ángeles?

No.

In an alternate timeline the major city in SoCal might have been called San Gabriel, which would be a great name for a city, but I kind of like the fact that LA is the only major city in CA that isn't named after a mission.

How about "Le détroit du lac Érié" for Detroit? Detroit could've just as well ended up being Erie, MI.