Automation

[Chris Angelico]

On Wed, Nov 20, 2013 at 12:55 AM, Tim Golden <mail at timgolden.me.uk> wrote:
> On 19/11/2013 13:50, Mark Lawrence wrote:
>> On 19/11/2013 10:48, Chris Angelico wrote:
>>>
>>> Anyway, we Aussies know more about your geography than you know about
>>> ours, I reckon. Which of these is not a real place: Parramatta,
>>> Warrnambool, Cerinabbin, Mordialloc? No fair Googling them, see if you
>>> can call it. I've been to three of the above places, the other one
>>> came up in a fantasy name generator.
>
> I thought that's how they came up with Australian place names normally?

Certainly not. The early white settlers had a very sophisticated
technique for naming places, and one that showed great respect for the
prior owners of the land: find the nearest person with darker skin
than yours, point to the surrounding area, and say "What's this place
called?". That's why most Australian place names translate to, in the
local language of the area, "Huh?" or "What do you mean?" or "I
haven't the faintest clue what you're talking about, old chap", or
occasionally "Place of the Elbow" or "Dung Heap" once they figured out
how easy these people were to troll.

No, the fantasy name generators are used in the US of A. And Canada
just picks someone else's place name and adds "-eh" to it.

ChrisA