Extraordinary Map Shows the Literal Meanings of City Names.

A while back, we published a map that shows the literal meaning of every country’s name and it was very informative and thought-provoking, and it stirred a lot of meaningful discussions. Today, we brought to you another map that is equally interesting. This map shows the meanings of the most famous cities around the world from all six continents. The map was put together by On The Go Tours. We broke it down into continents so you can gaze at each one individually. Please if you don’t see your city, add it in the comment section. Have a good read. Click on the images to enlarge. 


1. Africa

2. North America

3. South America

4. Europe


5. Asia

6. Oceania

7. World

You’ve reached the end of the article. Please share it if you think it’s interesting.


15 thoughts on “Extraordinary Map Shows the Literal Meanings of City Names.”

  1. Warsaw (in Polish: Warszawa {Varshava} took name from two people: Wars {Vars} and Sawa {Sava}. in legend Wars was a fisherman on Vistula river and Sawa was his wife. Warsaw not means “belongs to Warsz”. (i live in Warsaw so I know it 😉 )

  2. Ingrid Creyghton

    Very interesting Thx…I find most Christian names and Surnames also have a meaning because the get accepted on WF.

  3. The UK capital is London not Birmingham. Named from the Roman Londinium but there is no consensus as to what the meaning was.

  4. This is a cool list. Thank you for posting it! The city of my birth is known for its cars and its jazz music. Detroit means “the straits” (or narrows) and the Detroit River is the river-width water way from the upper three Great Lakes flowing into Lake Erie. That’s a lot of water in a narrow channel–you don’t want to try to swim it!

  5. I do not see why and I have not heard before that my city’s name means “dairy” literally. There are several hypotheses about its origin and meaning.

  6. I do not see why and I have not heard before that my city’s name means “dairy” literally. There are several hypotheses about its origin and meaning, but this isn’t one.

  7. I have the hots for Britt Ekland

    Of the cities in which I’ve lived:

    Portland’s name is man-made

    Bellingham and Seattle are named after people

  8. This is so wrong! The meaning of Athens is not beach ffs it derives from the name of an ancient greek goddess and she was not named after a beach. Also the meaning of Montevideo is not “I see a mountain” (there are not mountains in Uruguay anyway). Valencia(n.) is not powerful(adj.), it’s courage(n.). The list goes on and on…

  9. Some things are interesting and some are TOTALLY wrong… Ottawa is coming from a place name in Indegenous language. Marseille is coming from the Latin Massilia…

  10. Sorry, but I haven’t heard any part of the Hungarian capitol, Budapest in another words, and I’m sure it doesn’t mean “water furnace”. Maybe it has a meaning in another languages but they’re not Hungarian.

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