[gerdesj]

Oh do come on! There are loads of towns, cities, hamlets, villages, bergs, burys ... etc that have the same name in many places.

It doesn't help putting New on the front to differentiate either. Its not as though we do that here in the UK either (much): Newton Abbot, Newcastle, New Forest, New Market. I drive through a Newtown on the A303 in the Blackdown hills. Oh, perhaps we do.

Here in the UK, I believe Whitchurch is the most often seen name for a collection of habitation structures (best I can do at the moment). We very rarely have white churches - so I have no idea what that is all about. Perhaps the Whit- is actually wit: "wise/clever" cf: witten and whist.

I should drop this in, given the name: I live very close to Brunswick street in Yeovil, UK (http://www.yeovilhistory.info/brunswick-street.htm)

The first Brunswick was probably in Germany. -wick and similar are a common place suffix in English, German and Dutch (ie the Germanic languages) for a farm or market place. Ipswitch, for example, was once known as gipeswic. Norwich is a northern wick (cf Norvik)

Probably best to read the entire article.

[gnabgib]

There are only three New Brunswicks in the world, one Canadian Province (American: state, European: Country) - the default Wiki match for "New Brunswick"[0], and two American towns (56k New Jersey, and an unrecorded number in Indiana).

There are many places called Brunswick[1]. Brunswick is indeed from Germany, in honour of George III established in 1784[2]. Yes, your town of forked river/Gifle has a street name origin for the same reason, but it wasn't complete until at least 60 years later, and was originally named New France Street[3].

Bit of a miss on Whitchurch, ringing in with only 14[4] uses in the world, while Newtown[5] can be found 80 in places, excluding variants like Sturminster just down the road from you[6].

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Brunswick [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brunswick [2]: https://natural-resources.canada.ca/earth-sciences/geography... [3]: http://www.yeovilhistory.info/brunswick-street.htm [4]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitchurch [5]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newtown [6]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturminster_Newton

[gerdesj]

"Bit of a miss on Whitchurch"

Mr Big Bang ... Whitchurch has rather a lot of spellings. Also, relying on WP for all your references rarely works well.

My reference to Whitchurch was UK exclusive in context but there are quite a few in AUS, NZ, CA, US, SA and others.

I'm not sure why you conflate Sturmister Newton with a bog standard Newton. You'll be calling Newton Abbot a Newton next (I went to school there for a while). We have Newtons and Newhams and that pouring out all over the place here but they are largely unremarkable in this discussion because it is effectively a suffix or prefix associated with the real moniker. Sturminster -, - Abbot etc.

On the other hand a White Church generally is just that - a white church. However, some if not most are associated with wit as in wise and not the colour white. Also Church might be Kirk (Scotland) or Chapel (Welsh) and a lot of other spellings too.

I appreciate your research on WP but I think reality is a bit more complicated.

[vagrantJin]

> European: Country

I'm confused by the content in parentheses. are those examples of equivalence?

Since everywhere else in the world, state = country, and countries have provinces. including European countries.

Unless I misread, in which case nvm.

[KingOfCoders]

In Germany: US state = (federal) state (No wonder). No provinces :-) Also in German, province directly (mis-)translated to "Provinz" is a little bit of an insult.