The anglicisation of Gaelic placenames in Ireland has led to a few funny ones.
In Donegal, you’ve got Muff, which is just up the road from Gráinne’s Gap. Dear God, I hope Muff has a diving club.
In my own home county, Limerick, we’ve got Effin. In County Kerry you’ve got Spunkane. And they’re just the rude ones off the top of my head. Other than those, there are some wonderful sounding ones – Ballaghaderreen in Roscommon. Kerry has some beauts – Sneem is one of my favourites, as is Duagh (pronounced D’waah).
Incidentally, if any of you wondered and didn’t know why so many places in Ireland start with Bally (whereas no cities), it’s an anglicisation of the Irish word “Baile” (pronounced BAL-ya) which simply means “town”, or in some cases “village” and also just to confuse things, “home”. It can also come from “Béal Átha” (bail aw-ha) (literally Mouth Ford – so a river crossing) – which any of you who have visited Dublin would recognise from its Irish name “Béal Átha Cliath (Bail Aw-ha Kleeya) which of course didn’t get the English name – that comes from Dubh Linn (Duv Ling) – literally translated as Black Pool.
That’s probably the most common prefix in Ireland. Others are Dun/Doon (fort), Carrig/Carrick (Rock) (eg. Carrig-on-Suir where Sean Kelly hails from – Rock-on-the-river-Suir; or famously in the song “I wish I was in Carrickfergus (the rock of Fergus)) and as above “Ath” which comes from the “ford”. Bizarrely, sometimes names were just simply anglicised to the nearest English spelling and sometimes the names were translated and then given. Which is why we get lots of places ending in “Ford” – Wexford and Waterford being two of the most well known.