Celtic Place-Name Explainer
See what Irish, Welsh, Scottish Gaelic, Cornish, Breton and Manx place names mean, how to say them, and where they are.
339 place names
perhaps from a diminutive of scib, from English “skiff”
from pwll “pool” and heli “saltwater, brine”
perhaps originally “burial place”
from lorga “shin” or “stalk”
“fat promontory”
“chapel in the wood”
“red ford”
“the camp” or “the stronghold”
“crooked hill”
“dirty pool, boggy spot”
“Denbigh of the fishes”, that is, the little fort of the fishes
“honey meadow”
possibly “Tyr’s abode”, from Old Norse Týrvist; it is also read as tìr “land” and iodh “corn”
from cionn “head, headland” and sáile “brine, sea water”
“the little churches”
“Madog’s port”: a Welsh form of English Portmadoc, named after the surname Madocks
from a British word for “tent, temporary settlement”
“little sea”
“castle on the River Neath”
“hollow”
from muine “thicket”
“place of herds”
from fow “beeches” and gwydh “trees”
short for Abermaw, “mouth of the River Mawddach”
apparently from Old Irish násad, “gathering, assembly”: “the assembly place”
“mouth of the two Cleddaus”, where the White and Black Cleddau meet
“the grey stones”
“white valley”
“tribe of the Norsemen”
“headland”
“the red valley”
from cwm “valley” and brân “crow”
“church enclosure of Gwedhenek”, a personal name
from dôl “meadow” and cellau “cells”
“little fort”
from bos “dwelling” and mena “hill slope”
“short loch”
“valley of the Ebbw”
“mouth of the River Dare”
“harbour of Saint Piran”
“mouth of the River Gwaun”
“bridge of the pool”, with pŵl borrowed from English
“mouth of the River Honddu”
from roz “hill” and gov “smith”
“town of the abbey”
“stone (castle) of the woods”
“southern region”
“clear stream”, from fionn “fair, clear” and glas “stream”
Common place-name elements
Many names are built from a few common words. Pick one to see every place that uses it.
- llan · church, parish (26)
- aber · river mouth, confluence (16)
- caer · fort (9)
- cill · church (8)
- porth · port, harbour, cove (8)
- baile · town, settlement (7)
- pont · bridge (7)
- dún · fort (6)
- pen · head, top, end (6)
- áth · ford (5)
- tref · town (5)
- droichead · bridge (4)
- inis · island (4)
- ros · wood; headland (4)
- cwm · valley (4)
- tŷ · house (4)
- dùn · fort, fortress (4)
- ceann · head, headland (3)
- cúige · province (3)
- mainistir · monastery, abbey (3)
- castell · castle (3)
- coed · wood, forest, trees (3)
- din · fort, stronghold (3)
- dôl · meadow (3)
Go deeper than the map
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Meanings and glosses are adapted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0) and the other sources cited on each page. Map and area data © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).