You’re writing, speeding through scenes in a gush of inspiration, when your characters reach the town, mountain, forest of _______ and your (metaphorical) feet suddenly sink into the time-sucking swamp of naming.

A quick tip for when this happens: do what I did above and put a dash where the name of the person/place should be and keep writing. Resist the rabbit hole and return to your blank spaces after you’ve finished the scene.

Now,

The Basic Formula

 Adjective/Noun + Geographic/Architectural Term = 90% of Place Names

If you don’t believe me, take a drive around your nearest suburb and take note of the neighborhood and street names; or if you want to stay inside, study the city names on a map.

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Words to Mix & Match

This is a limited list, so please help flesh it out by commenting!

Adjective/Noun

Colors/Value

For more inspiration, see Crayola

• Clear
• White
• Bright
• Red
• Vermillion
• Pink
• Orange
• Yellow
• Green
• Blue
• Indigo
• Violet
• Purple
• Gray
• Dun
• Russet
• Brown
• Black

Animals

Feel free to get specific with species

• Badger
• Bear
• Bird
• Bobcat
• Deer
• Elk
• Fox
• Lynx
• Moose
• Rabbit
• Snake
• Weasel
• Wolf

Weather

• Cloud
• Rain
• Snow
• Storm
• Wind

Plants

• Aspen
• Briar
• Cedar
• Clover
• Flower
• Holly
• Ivy
• Mint
• Pine
• Reed
• Vine

Directions

• Deep/Shallow(s)
• High(er)/Low(er)
• North/South/East/West
• Outer/Inner
• Side
• Top/Bottom
• Winding

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Geographic

• Bank
• Beach
• Borough
• Boulder
• Breach
• Canyon
• Cave
• Cavern
• Chasm
• Clearing
• Cliff
• Cove
• Creek
• Dell
• Desert
• Dune
• Forest
• Glacier
• Glade
• Glen
• Gorge
• Hill
• Hole
• Inlet
• Lair
• Lake
• Ledge
• Mount/Mountain
• Pass
• Peak
• Pebble
• Plain
• Pond
• Pool
• Ravine
• Rift
• Rim
• River
• Rock
• Sand
• Shore
• Slope
• Stone
• Stream
• Swamp
• Swell
• Vale
• Valley
• Volcano
• Water
• Wood

Architectural

• Bridge
• Castle
• City
• Dun
• Fort
• Gate
• Howe
• Port
• Rest

Endings

• City
• Town
• Way
• -(n)ia
• -ton
• -ville

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A last tip…

My usual is to use this naming convention (adjective/noun + geographic/architectural term), but in a different language.

I choose a language that I will use to derive all of my names for the world or region and translate whatever name I chose into that language.

For instance…

Using Norse as my naming language, I want a place called Fox Pool. I can find an exact translation for Fox, foa, but I’m not finding pool, so I switch to Lake and find the word Vatn. I can keep these words separate, but I think it sounds better combined, so I end up with Foavatn.

Sometimes I switch the order of the words or Anglicize them by dropping a letter or two to make them seem a little more familiar to readers. In this case, I would drop the last n, leaving me with Foavat, a name that holds a good flavor but is somewhat pronounceable.

And other times, I cheat and just use the word for city or town in a different language and leave it at that.

How do you name places? Have any words or categories to add to the lists? Email me at thespinningpen@gmail.com or comment below!

-Abigail signing off-