An analysis of 42,215 British place names, showing the most common names, the most common name beginnings (prefixes) and name endings (suffixes). [OC]
Posted by neilrkaye
![An analysis of 42,215 British place names, showing the most common names, the most common name beginnings (prefixes) and name endings (suffixes). [OC]](https://www.byteseu.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/oosy7p3xqhhg1-1136x1536.png "An analysis of 42,215 British place names, showing the most common names, the most common name beginnings (prefixes) and name endings (suffixes). [OC]")
An analysis of 42,215 British place names, showing the most common names, the most common name beginnings (prefixes) and name endings (suffixes). [OC]
Posted by neilrkaye
23 Comments
I don’t know why, but I find this really fascinating.
Created using ggplot in R using data from here:
[https://github.com/alasdairrae/gb-places/blob/master/csv-zip/gb_populated_places_all_BNG_csv.zip](https://github.com/alasdairrae/gb-places/blob/master/csv-zip/gb_populated_places_all_BNG_csv.zip)
Bottom is bottom of the list
West *would* be the most commonly cited direction wouldnnit.
Do they stack? Are there like six places across the UK called West Newtownton?
Westton not being most common place name disappointed me
Newnewtowntown is well worth a visit
A silly, engaging, fascinating thing to graph. Wonderful. Alternating shades for the bars is nice.
Charlton and kirkton next to each other..
How did you carry out this analysis?
Throw any two of the pretty or grand sounding ones together to get the name of your next housing development!
Newtownton sounds a fun place
Upper Dicker
My favourite 🤣🤣
Townton is beautiful this time of year…
This child of the Danelaw wants to know where “-by” is on the list of place endings. Seems odd that it doesn’t appear at all.
This data is inaccurate, or missing information. (not blaming OP, but their source)
The [Gazetteer of British Place Names](https://gazetteer.org.uk/search?type=ew&place=by) lists 577 settlements which end in “by”, but “by” isn’t even in the list above. I picked a few more at random – “little london” is missing 13 settlements, “west” is out by over 100, and “bottom” is too low.
I love some of the fictional names you can make combining the equally ranked prefixes and suffixes
Lowhill
Woodwell
Greatstreet
Kingdon
Hightown
Churchland
Middlemoor
Higherhall
Crossrough
Watercombe
Newtoncorner
Nortonnewton
Chapelbottom
I love how in the top 6 there is Newtown, Newton and New Town. Brits back then were so uncreative that every new settlement just became a “new town” and they stick with it.
Hams were short for Hamlet or small village. Grew up in a few hams in the UK.
This is basically a list of Massachusetts towns.
West Newtownton would be the perfect place to be from👌🏻
So, in theory, West Newtownton should be the most common place!
I’m from West Newtown-ton so this makes sense to me