Turkmenistan Place Names Explained

Having blogged samples of my books on English place names and also examined the etymologies of the nations of the world and their respective capitals I thought it time I cast my net a little wider. As English place names share some links to other tongues it would be interesting to see if any of the elements contributing to our place names could be found elsewhere. Continuing an alphabetical tour of the world and a look at the largest Turkmenistan cities.

Ashgabat translates from the Persian as 'city of love' or 'city of devotion'.

Turkmenabat, which clearly refers to the people, was formerly known known Chharjvy, the Persian for 'four canals'.

Dasoguz is the Tyrkmen for 'stone spring'.

Balkanabat adds abad to the name of Balkan mountains. It was founded as Neftedag in 1933, this from the Russian neft dag or 'oil mountain'.

Yoloten translates as 'the way passes over'.

Marghab is a river which takes its name from the Murghab District.

Anua comes from the Persian and means 'new water'.

Geok Tepe comes from Turkmen and means 'blue hill or summit'.

Murgap comes from the Turkmen roots mur gap and describes 'the land with the place of water'.

Note the spellings of the places are English as the piece is written in English.