Editor’s note: Welcome to InDepthNH.org’s column Speaking of Words. Michael Ferber retired from the English Department at UNH, but has plenty more to say and write about words. We are thrilled he wants to do that for our readers. Welcome Michael!
Speaking of Words
By MICHAEL FERBER
Suppose you knew nothing at all about New Hampshire except that it is one of the United States, but you had a good detailed map of it. What could you infer about it?
You would readily conclude that it considers itself a part of England, or did so once, because of its 234 cities and towns the majority are named after British cities and towns, and of these most are English.
There are eight “chesters,” for instance: Chester, Chesterfield, Chichester, Dorchester, Lancaster, Manchester, Rochester, and Winchester. The original chesters are all in Britain, named after the Roman word for a military camp, castra. The Romans never came to America, so the names must have been brought over by the British.
You might have been struck by all the “hams”: Chatham, Durham, Effingham, Gorham, Grantham, Nottingham, Pelham, Stratham, and Windham, not to mention Hampstead and Hampton. And New Hampshire. Ham is the Old English source of home: We have hamlets still, and Hampstead means “homestead.” You will have noticed several “new” versions of English places: New Boston, New Durham, New Hampton, New Ipswich, New London, and New Hampshire itself; these confirm your hunch that this is some kind of new version of England.
You might be puzzled, however, over New Castle. Shouldn’t it be either Newcastle or New Newcastle? You wouldn’t know that it was named after its own early “castle” or fort.
At least one of the names is Welsh (Landaff), one is Cornish (Cornish), and several are Irish (Antrim, Dublin, etc.). When I was driving with a British friend on Route 93 a few years ago, she was astonished to see a sign naming Derry and Londonderry as two different towns. In Northern Ireland they are the same city, and your life might depend on what you called it when asked. Not a bad idea to separate them.
It would be easy to be misled by quite a few names that look sort of English but are named after men, but if you looked up these men you would gather that at one point New Hampshire was governed by British generals and earls: Amherst, Boscawen, Fitzwilliam Holderness, Keene, Temple, Strafford, Wentworth, and quite a few others.
But then you would notice Washington, Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, and Lincoln and conclude that something big happened in the eighteenth century—even before you noticed the obsessive naming of New Hampshire mountains after such men. It would be puzzling that Washington and Lincoln are both places in England (the English Washington is next to Concord, of all places), but at least these men, if you guessed they were men, were not earls.
You might decide that a modest number of people came from mainland Europe, notably from Berlin, Franconia, Lisbon, or Milan, a very modest contingent in comparison with Maine, which has so many towns like Belgrade, Calais, China, Denmark, Dresden, Frankfort, Lisbon, Mexico, Moscow, Norway, Paris, Peru, Poland, Stockholm, Sweden, Vienna, and Wales that you would be forgiven for guessing that Maine is the site of the United Nations headquarters. But Maine names are a topic for another time.
You would note that New Hampshire has several placenames from the Bible: Bethlehem, Canaan, Goshen, Hebron, Lebanon, Salem, and Sharon. Since it is unlikely that their settlers came from the original places so named, you could reasonably conclude that there were lots of Christians in New Hampshire, or maybe Jews. A few classical names, however, might give you pause. Troy, for instance, the city destroyed by Greeks hiding in a big wooden horse: Why would you name a new town after it? Maine and Vermont also have a Troy, and so do New York, Ohio, and many other states. (One website asserts there are 97 Troys in America, the most popular classical name!)
There are also Alexandria, Candia, and Laconia. Candia is odd: it is the Italian name of the Greek island of Crete. Why Candia? Not because someone was reading the Iliad. It seems that the Royal Governor Benning Wentworth was once a prisoner on that island. Even if we count Candia, though, the number of classical names in New Hampshire is paltry compared to those in New York, some fifty-two of them, including Italy, Greece, Rome, Athens, and some eighteen Roman men: Brutus, Cato, Cicero, Cincinnatus, Fabius, all the way down to Virgil. But that’s also another topic for another time.
Three town names, including the capital, might suggest to you that some settlers, at least, had a propensity for allegory and high ideals: Concord, Freedom, and Unity. They sound like very nice places to live in. There is no Utopia, however; for that you must go to New York, Florida, Texas, or a few other states.
Finally you would notice some names you cannot decipher: Merrimack, Nashua, Ossipee, and Sunapee. If settlers came up with these names, where did they come from? There are just a few such towns, but as you scan your map you would see there are lots of lakes, rivers, and mountains with names like those, a colorful chorus of sounds unlike English or any language of Europe: Baboosic, Chocorua, Contoocook, Kancamagus, Massabesic, Monomonac, Nubanusit, Pawtuckaway, Pemigewasset, Penacook, Piscataqua (though that one looks like Latin), Skatutakee, Squam, Umbagog, Waukewan, Wicwas, Winnipesaukee, and Winnisquam. Whoever these people were, they seem to have more or less avoided towns and chosen to live near lakes, rivers, and mountains. Very romantic and charming of them. The unhappy truth would escape you, but that’s yet another topic for yet another time.
At this point you might conclude that your puzzling map won’t explain itself and you had better come to New Hampshire in person to figure out who settled there and when. You would be very welcome to visit, of course. Bienvenue and all that. But do bring a little extra money for the meals and rooms tax.
I am happy to hear from readers with questions or comments: mferber@unh.edu.