Queen of the World @rivan-queen - Tumblr Blog

On top of that, a lot of (foreign) names for tribal groups or communities boil down to:

"Those Guys Who Aren't Us".

This happened for the same reason, explorers talking with a group they had contact with and asking them about their neighbours. These names are known as exonyms because they've been applied from outside the group.

One famous example is Eskimo - the etymology is disputed but the most accepted meaning is "The Guys Who Wear Snowshoes", as named by tribes who did not wear snowshoes. That's why the word has been phased out for Inuit - lit. "The People" (or, essentially "Us").

Or my favourite one - we don't know what the Celts called themselves. Celt comes from the Greek keltoi, meaning "Foreigner". The Romans referred to the Celtic peoples of modern-day France as gauls, meaning... "Foreigner". The French refer to the Welsh as gallois, meaning... "Foreigner"!

Even "Welsh" essentially means "Foreigner"! It's derived from a generic Old German word for people living in Gaul. But the Welsh call themselves Cymry, which means "fellow countrymen".

In short: scratch the surface and many names mean either "us" or "them", and no one in human history has had any imagination.

geeoharee

You can't complain about people being called 'The People' when you live on a planet called 'The Ground'.

writing-prompt-s

Two identical infants lay in the cradle. “One you bore, the other is a Changeling. Choose wisely,” the Fae’s voice echoed from the shadows. “I’m taking both my children,” the mother said defiantly.

dycefic

Once upon a time there was a peasant woman who was unhappy because she had no children. She was happy in all other things – her husband was kind and loving, and they owned their farm and had food and money enough. But she longed for children.

She went to church and prayed for a child every Sunday, but no child came. She went to every midwife and wise woman for miles around, and followed all their advice, but no child came.

So at last, though she knew of the dangers, she drew her brown woolen shawl over her head and on Midsummer’s Eve she went out to the forest, to a certain clearing, and dropped a copper penny and a lock of her hair into the old well there, and she wished for a child.

“You know,” a voice said behind her, a low and cunning voice, a voice that had a coax and a wheedle and a sly laugh all mixed up in it together, “that there will be a price to pay later.”

She did not turn to look at the creature. She knew better. “I know it,” she said, still staring into the well. “And I also know that I may set conditions.”

“That is true,” the creature said, after a moment, and there was less laugh in its voice now. It wasn’t pleased that she knew that. “What condition do you set? A boy child? A lucky one?”

“That the child will come to no harm,” she said, lifting her head to stare into the woods. “Whether I succeed in paying your price, or passing your test, or not, the child will not suffer. It will not die, or be hurt, or cursed with ill luck or any other thing. No harm of any kind.”

“Ahhhhh.” The sound was long and low, between a sigh and a hum. “Yes. That is a fair condition. Whatever price there is, whatever test there is, it will be for you and you alone.” A long, slender hand extended into her sight, almost human save for the skin, as pale a green as a new leaf. The hand held a pear, ripe and sweet, though the pears were nowhere ripe yet. “Eat this,” the voice said, and she trembled with the effort of keeping her eyes straight ahead. “All of it, on your way home. Before you enter your own gate, plant the core of it beside the gate, where the ground is soft and rich. You will have what you ask for.”

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Me: :(

History: names ending in -ac in southwest france are likely gaulish or at least gallo-roman in origin (-acum > ac). -ac is a suffix highlighting that something is possessed. You could translate it by "belong to" or "with". It is prominent in the south mostly because of said gallo-roman influence in the region (multiple settlements to be found). In conclusion villages and towns' names are often anthropotoponyms, meaning we can trace back that the area belonged to a specific man 2000 years ago. For exemple mauriac means "the possesion of marius"

Me: :)

caecilius-est-pater

Same with Anglo-Saxon place names ending in "-ing", which means "the people of". So for example Reading in England means it was founded by the family, tribe, or clan of a person named Reada. Sometimes it goes in the middle of multiple suffixes, so for example Willingham means "Will's family's village" or "Will's family's homestead" (not "ham" as in pork but "ham" as in an old Germanic word that we kept in "home" and "hamlet" - the small village not the fictional Danish prince)

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why does this have 85K notes