It is a very European thing to give fairly unique names to all the streets, even the tinest backalley of any city, town, village, hamlet or country road in the country. Americans don't bother and just give numbers to minor streets. In many Asian countries (e.g. Japan, Korea, Thailand, Indonesia), the authorities also only name major roads and avenues, and do not even have numbers for smaller ones. Chinese street names typically indicate their geographic location (East, West, etc.).
Back to Europe after 5 years in Asia, I rediscover the delight of happening upon interesting street names while exploring towns and cities. In Brussels, many neighbourhoods have themes for the street names. For instance, around the EU Commission district, the streets have names with connections to Belgian history (Celts Avenue, Ambiorix Square, Clovis Boulevard, Charlemagne Boulevard, Philip the Good street, Maria-Theresa street, Joseph II street...) while in the EU Parliament district, the streets are named after towns on either side of the Eastern border of Belgium (Spa street, Arlon street, Trier street, Luxembourg street...).
But that's a bit plain. The most interesting names are to be found in the historic centre.
The first category of street names relates the way the city used to be organised in medieval times. We will find :
- old job names (butchers' street, hatters' street, dyers' street, tanners' street, spur-makers' street, fishermen's street, jewelers' street, embroiderers' street, carpenters' street, crossbow-makers' street...)
- market names (coal market, chicken market, herb market, cheese market...)
- product names (butter street, stone street, pepper street, hop street, parsley street, olive street, wool street...)
- old quay names (charcoal quay, bricks quay, hay quay, cut stones quay...)
In the middle of all these regular street names are hidden some of the weirdest names I have ever seen. Here are a few that I remember (English translation in brackets):
- Rue du chien marin (marine dog street)
- Rue des boiteux (gimps street)
- Rue du fossé aux loups (wolves ditch street)
- Rue de la montagne aux herbes potagères (vegetable garden herbs' mountain street)
- Rue du chien vert (green dog street)
- Rue du jardin rompu (broken garden street)
- Impasse de la fidélité (blind alley of fidelity - as long as it is not "the blind alley of infidelity" !)
Does your city/town/village have strange or funny street names as well ? Please share them with us here.
Back to Europe after 5 years in Asia, I rediscover the delight of happening upon interesting street names while exploring towns and cities. In Brussels, many neighbourhoods have themes for the street names. For instance, around the EU Commission district, the streets have names with connections to Belgian history (Celts Avenue, Ambiorix Square, Clovis Boulevard, Charlemagne Boulevard, Philip the Good street, Maria-Theresa street, Joseph II street...) while in the EU Parliament district, the streets are named after towns on either side of the Eastern border of Belgium (Spa street, Arlon street, Trier street, Luxembourg street...).
But that's a bit plain. The most interesting names are to be found in the historic centre.
The first category of street names relates the way the city used to be organised in medieval times. We will find :
- old job names (butchers' street, hatters' street, dyers' street, tanners' street, spur-makers' street, fishermen's street, jewelers' street, embroiderers' street, carpenters' street, crossbow-makers' street...)
- market names (coal market, chicken market, herb market, cheese market...)
- product names (butter street, stone street, pepper street, hop street, parsley street, olive street, wool street...)
- old quay names (charcoal quay, bricks quay, hay quay, cut stones quay...)
In the middle of all these regular street names are hidden some of the weirdest names I have ever seen. Here are a few that I remember (English translation in brackets):
- Rue du chien marin (marine dog street)
- Rue des boiteux (gimps street)
- Rue du fossé aux loups (wolves ditch street)
- Rue de la montagne aux herbes potagères (vegetable garden herbs' mountain street)
- Rue du chien vert (green dog street)
- Rue du jardin rompu (broken garden street)
- Impasse de la fidélité (blind alley of fidelity - as long as it is not "the blind alley of infidelity" !)
Does your city/town/village have strange or funny street names as well ? Please share them with us here.