I recently got interested in adding *:etymology=* to all streets in my quarter. However, not all of them are named after famous people, a lot are named after regional people, like the ex-chairman of a local sports club, a former local mayor or sometimes even an old regional word. Usually, I would add a name:etymology:wikidata=* pointing to the entry that describes the person/feature, but what to do if they don’t have any? These, to me, are the most interesting ones, because hardly anyone young will “remember” the mayor of 1954 of a former city which is now a suburb.
The name:etymology=* clearly states that it “[…]is intended for a name or sometimes a word, but not a full etymology tracing the evolution of that word, as one would find in a dictionary.”, so I should not add something like name:etymology=Johann Piltz, former chairman of the SG Misburg or name:etymology=List, old North German term for a settlement on the edge of a forest
What I started doing was name:etymology:description=Longtime chairman of the SG Misburg, but I wonder if there is something better for this.
In short: what is the correct tag to add etymology description to a name?
And what if it’s an old regional term describing something that is specific? The case is “Am Forstkamp”:
“Forst” is another German word for “forest”
“Kamp” is a local term for a measured piece of land / a parcel (probably comes from latin “campus”)
But it’s referring to a specific forest, the “Misburger Wald” (Misburger Forest) and a specific parcel Now… what would I put into etymology? A link to the “Misburger Forest”, a link to “Kamp”, or rather an explanation that this street was once running along the Misburger Forest (that was 50 years ago, of course it’s no longer there) and is named after the parcel of land (Kamp) directly next to the forest?
Yes, I could of course create a wikidata entry for this historical parcel of land, but seriously? Is there no way to add this somehow?
of course with free tagging you could also add “name:etymology=Italian Astronomer of the 16th century” but it would not lead to results that a computer could easily interpret, e.g. for statistical questions like how many streets are named after men vs. women. Still it would be useful for other humans who understand the language.
“Kamp” is a local term for a measured piece of land / a parcel (probably comes from latin “campus”)
But it’s referring to a specific forest, the “Misburger Wald” (Misburger Forest) and a specific parcel Now… what would I put into etymology?
in name:etymology for “Am Forstkamp” you would put Forst and Kamp, the generic ones because these are generic, and for the Misburger Wald you would have Misburg and Wald
I’m sorry if that seems a dumb question, but the historical etymology is derived from the “Misburger Wald”, whereas the linguisitic etymology is derived from the generic term “Forst”. Personally, I’d be much more interested in the historic etymology, but I can see arguments for both.
I don’t know historical etymology, I believe the tag is to explain the name, and there is no trace of Misburger Wald in Am Forstkamp, hence the second version is better and the first one incomprehensible
This is the approach I’ve taken, where the name derives from a village which disappeared around 1500. I use name:etymology:description to provide a more detailed account of the etymology, and name:etymology for the name itself.
An alternative is to include both in name:etymology, as here.
I think both work fine, as most people will want to use the wikidata tags for more intricate searches, particularly looking for places with shared etymological elements, whereas free-form text is useful to both editors and applications consuming the values directly.
If you consider place names such as the following in Sankt Anton, Tirol: Gampen (not explicity named on OSM) and Mattun (a locality as well as a ski run). These have origins in Latinate languages (similar to modern Romansh and Ladin) and pre-date the arrival of German speakers. Gampen is related to Latin Campus, and I believe Mattun refers to a plant in the cabbage family. SAC Alpine guides often have a useful section on etymology of this sort. The zone of place names derived from Latinate languages which have been inhabited by German speakers for perhaps 800-1000 years is quite broad (50-100 km), and one I’ve always found very interesting. I think such information absolutely needs some kind of descriptive text, and cannot readily be met by a single value.
PS. There is a very interesting slide deck from a researcher who was part of the team who collected a vast number of local toponyms across the Tirol. From an OSM perspective the slides contain some intriguing remarks about name origins, etymology and orthography. The map of names can be browsed here.
I also think this is the way to go. By the way, maybe someone didn’t noticed it so I point it out: after an update (last month) https://etymology.dsantini.it/ supports the name:etymology:description=* value as well.
So if the street was named after a person without a Wikipedia/Wikidata entry, would you put only the name of that person in etymology:name (e.g., name:etymology=Johann Piltz), or also something that briefly clarifies who they were (e.g., name:etymology=Johann Piltz, long time chairman of the SG Misburg)? I’m asking, because the information that the Johann-Piltz-Street is named after Johann Piltz is pretty useless.
The same goes for a name like “Thomas-Mann-Platz”. It could be the famous author, or the local politician. Of course, the name:etymology:wikidata-would uniquely clarify this, but would you only put name:etymology=Thomas Mann, or rather name:etymology=Thomas Mann (politician)? The wiki says to put the full name of the wikidata entry into name:etymology, but it doesn’t seem to make any sense, if it’s a very common name and doesn’t clarify anything
I think a full description in the name:etymology=* tag is the best way to go. I can think of no short name that would be useful to a machine, or to a human.
Also, a short Wikipedia article about a former football club manager is easy to make. One sentence about him being in that position, and a sentence about how a street is named after him. That’s pretty notable.
Also, a short Wikipedia article about a former football club manager is easy to make. One sentence about him being in that position, and a sentence about how a street is named after him. That’s pretty notable.
it could be not sufficient to climb the bar for the German WP, they are rather picky probably because they are considerate towards those printing the complete content on paper, so strict rules regarding encyclopedicity are applied (the lemma shall respect 20th century criterion for inclusion into a printed book).
