For example Mount Maunganui. In Māori maunganui means "large mountain" and thus when literally translated into English it means "Mount Large Mountain". Another example would be the river Avon. In Brythonic avon means river and thus when literally translated into English it means "river River".
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4Not that it matters in the grand scheme of things, but FWIW, I'm starting to think that the close voters with the "language-specific grammar or usage" offtopic reason are basically trolls. And good thing StackExchange says to be nice to new contributors.– LjLOct 23, 2019 at 15:34
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3cf. Recursive Acronym Syndrome Syndrome (RAS Syndrome)– ArteliusOct 24, 2019 at 0:20
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1 Answer
What you are looking for is a tautological place name. Other examples are East Timor (East East - English/Indonesian), The La Brea Tar Pits (The "The Tar" Tar Pits - Spanish/English), and Glendale (Valley Valley - Gaelic/Danish).
answered Oct 23, 2019 at 12:41
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5Your East Timor example is confusing - Timor comes from Timur which means east, but it's called "east" because it's an island in the east of the Indonesian archipelago. However, East Timor refers to the eastern section of that island. The Indonesian name for East Timor is Timor Timur (the country calls itself Timor L'Este now). It's not superfluous to say East Timor, unlike the other cases that you mention, because it's referring to the eastern part of and island in the east. There's also West Timor - Timor Barat, which refers to the part of the island that is part of the country of Indonesia. Oct 24, 2019 at 10:52
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3‘Torpenhow’ is a triple tautology, meaning ‘Hill-hill-hill’. (Unfortunately, there isn't a Torpenhow Hill, which would be a quadruple name…)– giddsOct 24, 2019 at 15:34
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1@gidds, but if you follow the link in the answer you'll see mention of a Pendleton Hill which (depending on the analysis of -ton) might be a quadruple name. Oct 24, 2019 at 17:45
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